/ 




ONE MOKE UNFORTUNATE. (I'lii;*' 469.) 




GUANU STAIRt'ASK, I5UCKING11AM PALACE. 



1 



V 



PALACE AND HOYEL: 



OB, 



PHASES OF LONDON LIFE. 



PERSONAL OBSERVATIONS OF AN AMERICAN IN LONDON. BY DAY AND NIGHT ; WITH 
GRAPHIC DESCRIPTIONS OF ROYAL AND NOBLE PERSONAGES, THEIR RESI- 
DENCES AND RELAXATIONS ; TOGETHER WITH VIVID ILLUSTRA- 
TIONS OF THE MANNERS, SOCIAL CUSTOMS. AND MODES OF 
LIVING OF THE RICH AND THE RECKLESS, THE 
DESTITUTE AND THE DEPRAVED, IN THB 
METROPOLIS OF GREAT BRITAIN. 



VAIjXJAJBI-iE statistical IN-FORIwrATIOKT, 

COLLECTED FBOM THE MOST RELIABLE SOURCES. 



BY 

DANIEL JOSEPH KlUWAN. 

Beantifhlly Illustrated with Two Hundred Ingravings, and a finely executed Map of London. 
/ 



PUBLISHED BY SUBSCRIPTION ONLY. 

BELKl^AP & BLISS. 

W. E. BLISS, TOLEDO, OHIO. — NETTLETON & CO., CINCINNATI, 

OHIO. — DUFFIELD ASHMEAD, PHILADELPHIA, PA. 

UNION PUBLISHING CO., CHICAGO, ILL. 

A. L. BANCROFT & CO., SAN FRANCISCO, CAL. 

1870 




Bntbbkd according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870, by 

BELKNAP & BLISS, 
In the Clerk's Office of tlic District Court of Connecticut. 



I THE LIBRAKT 
or CONGR£SS 
WAtBINOTON 






WILLIAM n. LOCEWOOD, 
ElectrotyixT, 

BAETrOBP, COMB. 



% 



TO 



OP 

NKW YORK CITY, 

A 

Tl\UE pENTLEMAN IN ^VEI^ OuALlTY AND pUTY OP LlPE, 

THESE PAGES ARE DEDICATED, 

AS A 

^J-IQHT TE^TIjVlOj^Y 

TO THE 

J]HVA.I\YIHG J'^I^ENDSHIP BOI\NK BY HIM FOR THli >iUTHOR 



PREFACE. 



In offering this volume to the Public, the result of a year's experience and 
labor, I must indeed feel gratified, and more than rewarded, if any of those 
■who may peruse its pages shall find in them a tithe of the pleasure which 
I enjoyed in journeying in and about the nooks, crannies, and curious places, 
of what may be justly called the greatest and most populous City of the 
Modern World. 

Believing that a Metropolis of Three and a Half Millions of people should 
be observed and described, if observed and described at all, in a large and 
comprehensive sense, in order that a thorough knowledge of it may be ob- 
tained by those who will do me the honor of turning the leaves of this book, 
I have not hesitated to take my readers into places which they might shrink 
from visiting alone, and which are rarely or ever seen by the stranger, in 
London. Therefore have I sketched its Haunts of Vice, Misery, and Crime, 
as well as its fairer and brighter aspects, with no faltering in my purpose, so 
that the American people might see London as I saw it, and as it exists To- 
Day. 

The material employed in making the book was gathered from personal 
observation, while acting as a Special Correspondent of the New York 
World, in London, and I cannot do less than make an acknowledgment of 
the kindness of its Editor, Mr. Manton Marble, by whose permission I have 
used some portions of the matter embodied in this work. 

DANIEL JOSEPH KIRWAN. 
Hartford, August 1st, 1870. 




10. 

11. 

12 
13. 
14. 
15 
16. 
17. 
18. 
19. 
20. 
21. 
22. 
23. 
24. 
25. 
26. 
27. 
28. 
29 
30 
31. 
82. 
83. 
84. 
85. 



One More Unfobtu>'ate Frontispiece — 

Gkand Staircase, Buckingham Palace — Illuminated Title-Page 

Bikd's-Ete View op Losdon 17 

Initial Letter, 17 

The London Stone, 19 

"Thank you. Sib," 20 

The Rock and Chain, Tail Piece 23 

Initial Letter, 24 

Sword, &c.. Tail Piece, 27 

Entrance to Docks, 32 

" I DoNT Think it Will Hurt me," 34 

Forest, Initial Letter, 42 

Buckingham Palace (Full Page,) 45 

Portrait of Queen Victoria, 50 

John Brown Exercising the Queen, 53 

Fancy Sketch, Tail Piece, 56 

Lion on Guard, Initial Letter, 57 

PuRir Bill Showing us in, 61 

" Wont you T.ike Scmethino?" 63 

Snake Swallowing, 67 

" Bilking Bet takes the Chair," 72 

' Teddy the Kinchin's Song," 74 

Explosive M.atehials, Tail Piece, 75 

Initial Letter, 76 

CoGERs' Hall, Debating Club, 85 

Snake in the Grass, Tail Piece, 91 

Initial Letter, 92 

Conservative Club House 99 

Carlton Club House, 101 

Oxford and Cambridge Club House, 102 

United Service Club House, 104 

Architectural Sketch, Tail Piece, 106 

Initial Letter, 107 

Westminster Abbey, 109 

Shakespeare's Tomb, 115 

Tomb of Milton, 117 

ToMD OF Mary Queen of Scots, 118 

Coronation Chair, 121 

Gauntleted Hand and Sword, Tail Piece, 127 

Initial Letter, 128 

Victoria Theatre in the New Cut (Full Page,) 186 

KagFair 142 



Vi ILLUSTRATIONS. 

43. A Cell Wwbow, Initial Letter, 145 

44. Tae Last Execuiio.n at Newgate, 151 

45. Fetters and Ciiai.v, Tail Piece, 15S 

46. Broken Wheel, Initial Letter, 159 

47. Doctors" Commons, 162 

48. Eagle and Snakb, Tail Piece 166 

49. Initial Letter, 167 

60. A Bohemian Carouse, 171 

61 A Water Scene, Tail Piece 180 

52. Tower op London (Full Page,) _.. 182 

53 Initial Letter, 183 

54. Traitors' G.\te, 189 

55. The Crow.v J ewei^, 197 

56. Imperial Orb, A.mpclla and other Jewels 199 

57. The St.\te Salt-Cellars, 200 

58. Cannon, Tail Piece, 206 

59. Initial Letter, 207 

60. The Cadgers' JIeal, 210 

61. Raft Timber, Tail Piece, 215 

62. The Old Oak, Initial Letter, 216 

63. Bathing in Htde Park 219 

64. The L.^byrinth, 221 

65. The Crystal Palace 223 

66. iHi: Promen.U)e, Tail Piece 225 

67. Fort and W.wer Scene, Initial Letter, 226 

68. Portrait of the Prince op Wales, 230 

69. Prince and Cabman, 234 

70. Broken Wagon a.nd Dead Horse, Tail Piece, 239 

71. Blood-Hounds in the Leash, Initial Letter, 240 

72. Portrait of Lady Mordaunt, 243 

73. Portrait of the Duke of ILwiaTON 262 

74. Portrait op the Marquis of Waterford, 265 

75. Portrait of the Marquis of Hastings, 267 

76. Mounted Cannon, Initial Letter, 270 

77. Houses of Parliament (Full Page,) 272 

78. Portrait of William Ewart Gladstone, 274 

79. The Legislative Bar-Maid, ?T. 279 

80. Portrait of John Bright, 281 

81. The Student, Tail Piece, 284 

82. Initial Letter, 285 

83. " Could tod .Make it a Tanner?" 290 

84. The Speaker of the House 292 

85. First Lord op the Admiralty, 298 

86. Portrait of Robert E. Lowe, 300 

87. Ol.\dstone Speaking in the House of Commons (Full Page,) 307 

88 Landscape, Tail Piece, 317 

89. Initial Letter, ; 318 

90. The Pocket-Book Game, 324 

91. Steam Frig.^te, Tail Piece 329 

92. A Broadside, Initial Letter, 330 

93. The Sewer Hunter, 334 

94. Blood-Hound, Tail Piece, 336 

95. IsuND, Initial Letter, 337 

96. Oats Receiving Rations, 339 

9". The Great Porter Tun 341 

98. Initial Lctter, 344 

99. The Harvard Crew (Full Page,) 853 



ILLUSTRATIONS. VU 

100. Bridge, Tail Piece 361 

101. Initial Letter, 362 

102. The Oxford Crew, (Full Page,) 369 

103. The University Race, (Full Page,) 375 

104. Beautiful Cr.4.ft, Tail Piece, 381 

105. Initial Letter, 382 

106. Hospital Ship " DREADSOUonT," 384 

107. Jonathan Wild's Skeleton, 389 

108. Tail Piece 390 

109. Initial Letter, 391 

110. Coke Peddler, 399 

111. Bum Boatman, 401 

112. "I Gets it for Cigab Stumps,"' 403 

113. Street Acrobats, 405 

114. Pu.^'c^ and Judy, 407 

115. Initial Letter, 410 

116. Nelson's Monument, 416 

117. Damaged Tree, Tail Piece, 419 

118. Initial Letter, 420 

119. Nursery in the Foundling Hospital 421 

120. Washing the Waifs, • 427 

121. Landscape, Tail Piece, 434 

122. Initial Letter, 435 

123. Breakfast Stall, Covent Garden Market (Full Page,} 143 

124. The Orange Market, 450 

125. Going to Market, Tail Piece, 451 

126. Fancy Piece, Initial Letter, 452 

127. Wild and Desolate, Tail Piece, 4G0 

128. Initial Letter, 461 

129. Foreign Cafe in Coventry Street,., 462 

130. Canteen of the Alhambra, 471 

131. The Old Sinner, 473 

132. Rough AND Ready, Tail Piece, 475 

133. In the Haymarket, ^ 482 

134. Initial Letter, 486 

135. St. Paul's Cathedral, 487 

136. Sharp-Shooter, Initial Letter, 493 

137. "Beautiful Miss Neilson,". 494 

138. A Gin Public in the New Cut 500 

139. A Gallery of the "Vic," 502 

140. Putting on Airs, Tail Piece, 507 

141. Initial Letter, 508 

142. An Auction at Billingsgate Fish Market, (Full Page,) 511 

143. Initial Letter, .' 518 

144. Lincoln's Inn, 520 

145. Fancy Sketch, Tail Piece, 525 

146. An English Oak, Initial Letter, 526 

147. Bankers' Eating-House, 528 

148. The Bank of England, 533 

149. " I Began to Perspire," 538 

150. Carpet-B.\g, Tail Piece, 544 

151. London Bridge, (Full Page,) 546 

152. Forest Scene, Initial Letter, 547 

153. Temple Bar, Fleet Street, 550 

154. The New BLAgKFRiARS Bridge, 553 

155. Bridge and Water Scene, Tail Piece 555 

156. iNiTLiL Letter, 556 



Viii ILLUSTKATIONS. 

157. Windsor Castle, 560 

158. Tail Piece, 565 

161). I.MTIAL LETTEa, 666 

160. Loading tub Prison Van, 570 

161. Detective Irvixo, 572 

162. UEFORK TH8 LOBT) MaTor, 574 

163. BiiiLE AND Hand, Initial Letter, 676 

Ifrl. Portrait of Spuroeon 577 

165. Portrait OF Fatqer Ignatius 578 

166. " Lothair" (Marqdis or Blte,) 583 

167. Ruins, Tail Piece i 5S6 

168. Initial Letter, 587 

169. " Scott's ' in toe IIatmabeet, .'. 588 

170. The Midnight Mission, (Full Page,) 592 

171. " Skittles " and the Princess Mary, 595 

172. A Row in Cremobsf., 696 

173. Sword AND Purse, Initial Letter, C 598 

174. Portrait op " Madel Gret," 602 

176. Portrait of " Anontma," 605 

176. Portrait or " Baby Hamilton," 606 

177. Mabel Grev at Home, 609 

178. Portrait of " Alice Gordon," 613 

179. Snake and Dote, Initial Letter, 614 

180. A Meal at a Cheap Lodging Housb, (Full Page,) 617 

181. "Damnable Jack," 619 

182. Statue of George Peabodt, 625 

183. Tailpiece, 625 

184. Initial Letter, 626 

185. Old "Smudge,'' the Cabbt, 627 

186. "A Hansom Cab " 628 

187. " One Hundred Rats in Nine Mintjtes," , 630 

188. The Rat-Oatciier, 632 

189. " Paddvs Goose," 633 

190. Waiting FOR the Tide 634 

191. Ruins, Tail Piece, 635 

192. " TuE Times ' Office, 650 

193. The Suu-Editors' Room, "Daily Telegraph" Office 661 

194t. Portrait op James Anthony Froude, 639 

195. Portrait of Algernon Charles Swinburne, 641 

196. Portrait of John Stewart Mill 643 

197. Portrait of Benjamin Disraeli, 644 

198. Portrait of John Ruskin, 637 

199. Portrait of Charles Kingsley, 645 

200. Portrait of Anthony Trollope, 647 

201. Tail Piece, 652 

202. Initial Letter, 655 

203. Half-Penw Soup House, (Full Page,) 653 

204. A Pawn-Broker's Shop C56 

205. A Third Class Railway Carriage 659 

206. Tail Piece, 662 

207. Map of London, — 




CHAPTER I. 

THE MISTRESS OF THE WORLD. 

View from the Cupola of St. Paul's Cathedral — Population of London — Its 
Wealth and Poverty — Interesting Statistics, - - - 18 

CHAPTER II. 

THE SILEXT HIGHWAY. 

The Thames Embankment — The Tunnel — The Sub-way — Tunnel Thieves 
— Pneumatic Railway, ------ 24 

CHAPTER m. 

THE DOCKS, SHIPPING, AND COMMERCE. 

Custom-House Duties — Immense "Wine Vaults under the Docks — Hoisting 
and Discharging Cargoes — London and West India Docks — Opposition 
to the New Dock System — Dock Laborers, - - - 28 

CHAPTER IV. 

PALACES OF LOXDOX. 

St. James — Whitehall — Buckingham Palace — Magnificence of the Queen's 
Residence — The Grand Staircase — Queen's Library — The Famous John 
Brown, -------- A2 

CHAPTER V. 

HIDDEN DEPTHS. 

Underground Life — A Friendly Visit among Thieves and Pick-Pockets — 
The Midnight Feast, 58 

CHAPTER VI. 

DEBATING CLUBS AND COGERS' HALL. 

Society of Cogers — Tlie Most Worthy Grand — News of the Week — Inter- 
esting Debates — Irish Orator and Scotch Presbyterian — Liberals and 
Conservatives — "A^Tiere are we now?" — Farce and Tragedy, - 76 



X CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER Vn. 

CLUBS AND CLUB HOUSES. 

Aristocratic Members — Entrance and Subscription Fees — How Managed 
and Supported — Architectural Splendor — Choice AVines and Luxurious 
Dinners — Interesting Statistics — A ;ModeI Kitchen — Heavy Swell 
Club, 92 

CHAPTER Vm. 

WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 

Its Dimensions and Architectural Construction — Its Wealth and Immense 
Revenues — The Burial-Place of the Kings and Queens — Magnificence of 
their Tombs — Tomb of Shakespeare — Tomb of Milton — Tomb of Mary 
Queen of Scots — Coronation of William the Conqueror — The Massa- 
cre, ..---..- 107 

CHAPTER IX. 

THE COSTERMONGERS AND RAG FAIR. 

The New Cut — Heathenism of the Costers — Marriage Relation — Old Clothes 
District — Petticoat Lane — Congress of Rags — Modus Operandi of Sell- 
ing, -------- 128 

CHAPTER X. 

FROM NEWGATE TO TYBURN. 

Dying for an Idea — Execution of Barrett — !Man in the Mask — Famous 
Criminals — Pestiferous Prison — The Old Bailey Court — Hotel Regula- 
tions — Drinking from St. Giles' Bowl, _ _ - 145 

CHAPTER XL 

doctors' commons. 

Man-iage Licenses — Divorces — Ecclesiastical Court — High Court of Admi- 
ralty — Paying the Piper — Legal Scoundrelism — The Last Will and Tes- 
tamentsof Shakespeare, Milton, and of Napoleon Bonaparte — The For- 
gotten Sailor, - - - - - - - 159 

CHAPTER XH. 

' ■ THE BOHEMIANS OF LONDON. 

Carlisle Arms — A Pint of Cooper — Cockerell's Lodgings — Fitz and Dawson, 
or the Radical and Conservative Reporter — Tlie Short Hand Rejiorter — 
Dawson's Story — A Song from the Speaker — Beautiful Potato, 167 



CONTENTS. XI 



CHAPTER Xin. 

TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 

Its History and Dimensions — Council Chamber — Jolly Bishops and Royal 
Prisoners — The Traitor's Gate — Anne Boleyn — Princess EUzabeth — He- 
roism of Lady Jane Grey upon the Scaffold — The Crown Jewels — What 
can be seen for a Sixpence, ----- 183 

CHAPTER XIV. 

CADGERS OF LONDON BRIDGE. 

Under the Arches — Vagrancy and Pauperism — The Family Gathering — 
The Cadger's Meal— A Confirmed Vagrant— The Girl Molly— The 
Hopeful Son — The Cadger's Story, - - - 207 

CHAPTER XV. 

THE LUNGS OF LONDON. 

Regent's and Hyde Parks — Dimensions of the Public Parks and Gardens — 
What they Contain — Bathing in Hyde Park — Richmond Park with its 
Forests and Hunting Grounds — Hampton Court Park — Its Lab}Tinth — 
The Crystal Palace — Veteran Musicians — Greenwich Park — Grand Ob- 
servatory, - - - - - - - 216 

CHAPTER XVI. 

THE RAKES OF THE ROYAL FAMILY. 

Vagabonds in Kingly Robes — Prince of Wales and his Personal Friends — 
The Prince and the London Brewer as Firemen — Lord Carington as a 
Coachman — His Cowardly Assault upon Greenville Murray — The Prince 
and Cabman — Infamy of the Prince — A Mad King, - - 226 

CHAPTER XVH. 

FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

Lord Carington — Lady Mordaunt, Divorce Proceedings, and Interesting Tes- 
timony — Love Letters of the Prince — Duke of Hamilton — The Fastest 
Young Man in England — The IMarquis of Waterford — Marquis of Has- 
tings — Duke of Newcastle — Earl of Jersey — Lord Clinton and others, 240 

CHAPTER XVin. 

LORDS AND COMMONS. 

Westminster Palace and Houses of Parliament — Interior of the House of 
Commons — Bobbies and Cabbies — Strangers' Gallery — The Legislative 
Bar-Maid — William Ewart Gladstone — England's Greatest Commoner 
John Bright, ------- 272 



Xli CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XIX. 

LORDS AND COMMONS CONTINUED. 

Reporters' Gallery — Dr. Johnson taking Notes — Tlie Speaker and his "Wig 
— Important Personages — First Lord of the Admiralty — Peers in the 
Gallery — Gladstone's Early Life — The Eloquence of the Premier — The 
Sarcasm of Disraeli — Ducal Houses — Upper House of Parliament — 
Privileges of the Peers, ----- 285 

CHAPTER XX. 

LONDON POLICE AND DETECTIVES. 

The Old Jewry — Central Detective's Office — Relics of Crimes — Inspector 
Bailey — Experience of Mr. Funnell — Tlie Pocket-Book Game — New 
York a Precious bad Place — Police Districts — Expenses Attending them 
—River Thieves, .--..- 318 

CHAPTER XXL 

HUNTING THE SEWERS. 

The City Honey-Combed — 2,000 Miles of Sewerage — An Unlawful and 
Dangerous Business — Prizes Found — The Hunter's Story — Great Battle 
with the Rats — "Victory at last, - - - - 330 

CHAPTER XXIL 

BACCHUS AND BEER. 

The English a Great Beer-Drinking People — Amount of Exports — Barclay 
and Perkins — A Princely Firm — Cats on Guard — The House of Han- 
bury, Buxton & Co. — Great Porter Tun — Libraries in the Establishments 
— Quantities of Beer used in London, - . . 333 

CHAPTER XXHL 

HARVARD AGAINST OXFORD. 

Police Arrangements — Thomas Hughes, ^I. P. — Dark Blue and Magenta — 
On the Tow-Path — A Frightful Jam — Booths and Shows — Badges and 
Rosettes — The Dear Old Flag, . - _ . 344 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

STRUGGLE AND VICTORY. 

On Board the Press Boat — Tlie Harvard Crew — Loring's Condition — Sim- 
mons the Pride of the Crew — Tlie Oxford Crew — " Little Corpus," the 
Coxswain — Tlie Start — Harvard Leads — Burnham's bad Steering — Ox- 
ford's Vengeance Stroke — Tlie I.,ast Desperate Struggle — Beaten l)y 
Six Seconds — Fair Play and Courtesy, - - - 3G2 



CONTENTS. Xiii 

CHAPTER XXV. 

CURIOSITIES OF LONDON. 

"Domesday Book" — Oldest Books in England — Hospital Ship "Dread- 
nought " — A Gaudy Show — The Queen's Stage-Coach — Jonathan AVild's 
Skeleton — The Lord Mayor's State Coach — Installation of a London 
Sheriff, 382 

CHAPTER XX"Va 

STREET SIGHTS OF LONDON. 

Street Hawkers — Venders of Old Boots and Shoes — The Dog Fancier — Bird 
Sellers — Coke Peddlers — Bum Boatman — Stock in Trade — How Dick 
gets his Porridge — "I Gets it for Cigar-Stumps" — Street Acrobats — 
Punch and Judy Show, - - - - - 391 

CHAPTER XXVn. 

THE BRITISH MUSEUM AND NATIONAL GALLERY. 

Its Origin — Laying the Foundation — Reading Room — Departments of the 
Museum — The Galleries and Saloons — The Three Libraries — What can 
be seen — Nelson's Monument — Pictures and Works of Art in tlie Na- 
tional Gallery — The Great Masters — Free to the Working People, 410 

CHAPTER XXVHI. 

NAKED AND NEEDY. 

Infanticide — The Benevolent Captain — Foundling Hospital — Admission of 
Children — Great Numbers Received — How they Dine — How they Sleep 
— Washing the Waifs — Charitable Institutions — An Interesting Sight — 
Innumerable Bequests, _ _ . - _ 42O 

CHAPTER XXIX. 

MARKETS AND FOOD. 

Amount of Food Sold — Inspections — Metropolitan Cattle Market — New 
Smithfield Market — Covent Garden ]\Lirket — Hot Coffee Girl — Vegeta- 
ble Market — The Baked Potatoe Man — The Jews' Orange Market, 435 

CHAPTER XXX. 

SECRETS OF A RIVER. 

Waterloo Bridge — The Pale-Faced Girl — Tliree O'clock in the Morning — 
Weary of Life — A Leap from the Parapet — Fruitless Attempt to Save — 
A Sad Sight^Tlie Wages of Sin is Death, - - - 452 



xiv CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

IXTO THE JAWS OF DEATH. 

Leicester Square — Foreign Cafe in Coventry Street — The Abode of Sir 
Joshua Reynolds— The Residence of William Hogarth— Royal Alhambra 
Palace— The Great Social Evil—" Wottcn Wow "—In the Canteen— Tlie 
Old Sinner— The Tulip and the Daisy, - - 461 

CHAPTER XXXn. 

THE "ARGYLE," " BARNES'" AND «' CASINO." 

The Haymarket by Night — The Argyle Rooms — Fast Young Men — Paint 
and Jewelry — Silks and Satins — Free and Easy — Barnes' — "Holborn 
Casino" — A Magnificent Saloon — Good Night, - - 476 

CHAPTER XXXIH. 

ST. PAUL'S CATHEDRAL. 

Its History and Dimensions — Destruction of Old St. Paul's — Annual Reve- 
nues — Prices of Admission — Monuments to Nelson — Burial-Place of 
Wellington — Nelson's Funeral — A Grand Sight — "I am the Resurrection 
and the Life," ------- 486 

CHAPTER XXXrV. 

GOING TO THE PLAY. 

Beautiful Miss Neilson — The Lord Chamberlain a Censor — Royal Victoria 
Theatre — Covent Garden and Drury Lane Theatres — A " Gin Public " 
in the New Cut— The Gallery of the "Vic"— The Chorus of "Immen- 

, sekoff," ------- 493 

CHAPTER XXXV. 

BILLINGSGATE FISH MARKET. 

Profit on Fish — Oyster Boats — Number of Fishing Vessels — The Fish 
Woman — Tlie Old Style of Dress — Breakfast at Billingsgate — Capital 
Invested — Immense Sales, ----- 508 

CHAPTER XXXVI. 

THE INNS OF COURT. 

Number of Students — Gray's Inn — Tlie New Hall of Lincoln's Inn — Parlia- 
ment Chamber — How to become a Lawyer — Procuring Admission — 
'• Hall Dinners " — Cup of " Sack " — The Toast — Irish Students, 5J9 




CHAPTER I. 




THE MISTRESS OF THE WORLD. 

N the civilized world perhaps such an- 
other sight cannot be witnessed, as 
that which greets the eye from the 
great Cupola of St. Paul's, when the 
view is taken on a bright summer 
morning, after daybreak has settled on 
the leads and huge gilded cross of this, 
the most mighty of English Cathedrals. 
I saw this vast expanse of brick, stone, and mortar, one de- 
licious, but hazy September morning, from the outer circle of 
the dome, and I shall never forget that peopled metropolis 
which lay swarming below me like a vast human hive. 

For a radius of ten miles, the roofs and spires of countless 
religious edifices, dwelling-houses, banks, the tall cones of 
storied monuments, the delicate tracery of a forest of slender 
masts, and the smoky chimneys of innumerable breweries, 
manufactories, and gas-houses, met my vision, which had already 
begun to weary long before any of the individual characteris- 
tics of the British metropolis had segregated themselves from 
the aggregate mass. 
2 



18 THK MI.STRESS OF THE WORLD. 

Directly before me, and almost at my feet, lay the turbid 
Thames, winding in and out sinously under bridges, and heav- 
ing from the labor which the paddles of numerous steam craft 
impressed in its dirty yellow bosom. These small steamers 
were of a black and red, mixed, color, and it was only through 
a glass that I could discern where the two colors met and 
divided. Passing under the huge stone bridges, their smoke 
stacks seemed to break in two parts for an instant as they shot 
under an arch of the huge spans of London or Waterloo 
Bridges ; gracefully as a gentleman bows to his partner in a 
quadrille, and then the black funnels went back to their original 
erect but raking position with great deliberation. 

I had secured an eyrie in the top of St. Paul's at an early 
hour with the aid of a greasy half crown, which I had slipped 
to an old toothless verger with his sih-er-tipped wand, and he 
readily gratified my wish to allow me egress from the Whis- 
pering gallery which encircles the interior dome of the Cathe- 
dral, to a point where, giddily, I might lean out and look all 
over the great city. 

"It's as good as my place is worth, sir," said he, "to let 
you look out here. A man who was a little light headed from 
drinking tumbled from this window some years ago, and was 
broken to pieces on the cobble stones below." 

The danger did not prevent me from looking long and 
greedily at the splendid coup d'oeil. 

Far up the river to the left the queerly shaped toy turrets 
and massive ramparts and quadrangles of the Tower broke 
through the morning haze in shapely and artistic masses, and 
at the back of the green spot of grass which surmounts 
Tower Hill, the square, solid, and sul)fetantial looking Mint 
showed where Her Majesty's sworn servants were already at 
work employed in making counterfeit presentments of her 
features for circulation in trade and commerce. The Norman 
tower and flanking buttresses of St. Saviour's, Southwark, 
next came in range, fallowed liy the long oval glass roof of the 
Eastern Railway Terminus, facing Cannon street, where is 
erected London Stone, upon which Jack Cade sat in triumph 



THE MISTRESS OP THE WORLD. 



19 



before the dirty, noisy, rabble, which had followed his fortunes ; 
and now I can see Guy's Hospital with its hundred windows, 
the Corinthian Royal Exchange in Cornhill, the massive Guild- 
hall where many a bloated Britisher has fed on the fat of the 
land ; the Mansion House in which the Lord Mayor occasion- 
ally does petty offenders the honor of sentencing tliem to the 
Bridewell ; and now the view enlarges to the soutliward, and 
the eye takes in the fine Holborn Viaduct, lately honored by 
tlie Queen's presence ; Barclay and Perkin's massive cara- 
vanserai for the brewing of beer, and the gray stones of St. Sepul- 
chre's where the passing bell is always tolled for the condemned 
Newgate prisoner just before execution. The square, gray 
blocks of this fortress of crime 
gloom in an unpitying way be- 
low me, and there now is the 
court yard of Christ's Hospital 
with the gowned and bare head- 
ed school lads at their morning 
game of foot ball, and their 
shouts peal upward, even up as 
high as the dome of St, Paul's, 
like the chimes of merry music. 
The great piles of Somerset 
house and the Custom House 
frown down on the busy river, 
and the sound of the bell of St. 
Clement Dane's in the Strand, 
striking six o'clock, mingles with the mighty thunder whirr 
of the incoming trai^ from Dover, which dashes like a demon 
over the Charing Cross bridg(j and into its station. Structure 
after structure rises on tlie retina, the Treasury Buildings and 
Horse Guards in Parliament street, Marlbrough House, the 
British Museum, Buckingham Palace, the University College, 
the Nelson and York IMonuments, the splendid club houses in 
Pall Mall and St. James ; Apsley House and Hyde Park with 
its lakes of silvery water, Westminster Abbey, the Clock and 
Victoria Towers surmounting the Parliament Houses which 




THE LONDON STONE. 



20 



THE 3IISTRESS OF THE WORLD. 



overhang the Thcames, Lambeth Palace, the residence of the 
Archbi.shop of Canterbury, Chief Dignitary of the English 
State Chnrcliand Milbank Penitentiary down in dusty Westmin- 
ster, and by the way this prison with its eight towers looks like a 
cruet stand and its towers certainly represent the caster bottles. 
With its parterre of trees in the central square, the quadrangles 
of Chelsea Hospital, and the dome of the Palm House in 
Kensing-ton Garden next come under inspection, and finally I 
became weary in endeavoring to pierce the haze which the sun 

had broken into an- 
noying fragments, 
and failing to pene- 
t ra t e farther than 
\'auxliall bridge, I 
■z ive up the task and 
draw in my head af- 
ter a last look at the 
Catherine and West 
India docks, bewil- 
dered and confused 
by the very immensi- 
ty of wealtli and pop- 
ulation which is cen- 
tered and aggregated 
below, under and in 
the shadow of St. 
Paul's, the Mother 
Church of Great Brit- 
ain. 

Tlic verger says with a weak and wheezy voice : 
" Tliis is a worry great city, sir. They do say as how there's 
more nor three millions of hooman beings in this 'ere metrop- 
olis, and how they all gets a living is a blessed puzzle to me. I 
gets an occasional sixpence, and Americans seem to be more 
generous than any other visitors. Thank you, sir." 

London is a wonderful city in many ways. The year 1866 
brought the number of the inhabitants to the total of 3,186,000. 




" THANK TOU, SIR." 



THE MISTRESS OF THE WORLD. 21 

This is a population larger than that of Pekin, and as large 
and a half as that of London's great rival, Paris. It has a 
greater number of edifices devoted to religious worship than 
the Eternal City, Rome. Its commerce exceeds that of New 
York, Glasgow, Cork, Havre, and Bremen in gross. It sends 
abroad missionaries of all known sects, to convert the heathen 
and blackamoor, and for them and their wives there is a larger 
amount of money collected in London than could by any pos- 
sibility be subscribed in all the other great cities of the world 
combined for a like purpose. It numbers among its population 
more prostitutes and unfortunate females than Paris, there be- 
ing according to a calculation made by a former bishop of Ox- 
ford, 30,000 of this wretched class, alone, who are strictly 
professionals. 

London has work houses to accommodate 150,000 paupers 
under the parochial system, for which the residents or freehold- 
ers of every parish in the metropolitan district are taxed at 
an annual rate of fourteen pounds ten shillings per pauper, 
and yet men, women, and children die of starvation, weekly, in 
the slums of St. Giles, Saffron Hill, Bethnal Green, and Shore- 
Ditch. 

For a penny the young thief or abandoned street girl can 
listen to hoarse fiddling, obscene jests, and the lowest of low 
slang songs at some penny " gaff " in Whitechapel, and on a 
benefit night at Covent Garden, or the Haymarket, the man 
who is known in society will have to pay twenty-five or thirty 
shillings or from six to ten dollars to hear the musical warblings 
of a Patti or a Nillson. 

There are one hundred and three hospitals in London in 
which all the complaints, frailties, and misliaps of poor human 
nature are supposed to be provided for, and yet it will be 
much easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, 
or a rich man to get a free pass into paradise, tlian that a 
poor wretch without friends or influence should be able to 
find a bed in an hospital, unless he can succeed by a miracle 
in dodging the sentinels which red tape has placed at every 
entrance to these vamited institutions. 



22. THE MISTRESS OF THE WORLD. 

Dov.n in the quiet and aristocratic dwellings of Pimlico, you 
shall find such ladies as " Nelly Holmes," or " Skittles," and 
in St. Julin's Wood a" Mabel Gray," and in a delicious villa at 
Fulham, a " Formosa," spending in one night's Corinthian 
revelry the yearly salary of a bank clerk, or hazarding at a 
game of cards the life-time pittance of a sewing woman. And 
with these painted women shall be found night after night 
the curled darlings of the Pall Mall clubs, some of them mere 
youths who bear names as old as Magna Charta, and once as 
spotless pcrlwj^s as those of Sidney or Hampden. 

At Klancliard's, in Regent street, you may dine for a pound 
upon the choicest variety of dishes, cooked by a French Chef, 
who would scorn a gift of the Order of the Garter were it 
given to him without the proper culinary brevet to accompany 
it ; and at a ham and beef shop in Oxford street you may fill 
yourself to repletion, taking as a basis a pork saveloy for a 
penny, a " penn'orth" of bread as a second layer, a mutton-pie 
for " tuppence," a tart for a penny, and a pint of porter for 
" tuppence," and then as a relish of a literary kind, you can 
look at the great evening paper of London, the Echo, written 
in the most scholarly English, without any fee. Or you can go 
down Camden Town way, or up into Tottenham Court Road 
and get a kidney pie for two pence, or an eel stew for two- 
pence half penny, with a dry bun for a penny, and a good 
glass of Bass's ale for three half pence. And then you can 
go to Morlcy's or the Langham Hotel and pick your teeth and 
no one will Ijc the wiser. 

For other amusements there is the Zoological Gardens in the 
Regent's Park, with the anmsing elephant, the comic kangaroo, 
the graceful hippopotamus, the sleepy alligator, a band of 
music, lots of very ])rctty English girls, a score of impudent 
waiters in the restaurant to give you cold dishes when you call 
for hot ones, and all these delights may be enjoyed on six- 
penny days, and wlien you come out from the wild beasts, if you 
1)0 thirsty it will only cost you a half-penny for a chair in the 
Regent's Park with its noble avenues of stately trees, and the 
little old woman at the little old house which juts off the gate 



THE MISTRESS OP THE WORLD. 23 

will hand you a bottle of cooling ginger beer, a popular Cock- 
ney drink, for one penny. 

In the National Gallery, a magnificent structure which faces 
the Nelson Monument in Trafalgar Square, one of the finest 
collections of paintings in the world is hung. Here is the 
noble Turner Gallery, bought for the nation and free to all for 
copying or inspection. Here are Corregio's Angelos', Titians, 
the master pieces of Velasquez, Murillo, Paul Yeronese, the 
best things done by Etty, Landseer, Stanfield,Wilkie, Sir Joshua 
Reynolds, and nearly all of that glorious galaxy whose names 
have been painted too deeply in their grand canvasses ever to 
efface. All this is free to the public, poor and rich alike, but 
on Sunday, British piety bolts the lofty doors in their hapless 
faces. 

The Londoners have the finest public parks in the world. 
The flower beds in Hyde Park, Battersea Park, Victoria 
Park, Regent's Park, Kensington Gardens, and the Crystal 
Palace at Sydenham, are wonderful for their beauty and con- 
stant freshness, and in the Serpentine, a clear stream in Hyde 
Park, there is no hindrance from bathing, though the stream 
laves the margin of Piccadilly, one of the principal thorough- 
fares of the city, where many of the richest and most powerful 
of the nation have their mansions. 

This is London in brief. But a rapid and imperfect glance 
can be given of the wonderful city in the opening chapter of 
this book, but it is my purpose to give such details as I hope 
may instruct and amuse my readers, in the chapters that shall 
follow. 





CHAPTER II. 

THE SILENT HIGHWAY. 

5 HE Thames, the great river of England, 
Avhich enriches London ^ith the cargoes of 
its thousand ships, weekly, rises in the south- 
eastern slopes of the Cotswold Hills. For 
about twenty miles it belongs wholly to 
Gloucestershire, when for a short distance 
it divides that county from Wiltshire. It then separates Berk- 
shire first from Oxfordshire, and then from Buckinghamshire. 
It afterward di\ddes the counties of Surrey and Middlesex, and 
to its mouth those of Kent and Essex. 

It falls into the sea at the Nore, which is about one hundred 
and ten miles nearly due east from the source, and about twice 
that distance measured along the windings of the river. 

From having no sandbar at its mouth like the Mersey out- 
side of Liverpool, it is navigable for sea vessels to London 
bridge, a distance of forty-five miles from the Nore, or nearly 
a fourth of its entire length. The area of the basin drained by 
the Thames is estimated at about six thousand five hundred 
miles. 

The progress of half a century has made wonderful changes 
in the river. 

Wharves have taken the place of trim gardens, and the 
dirty coal scow is now found where the nobleman's state 
barge formerly anchored. 

No man, it is said, can count the national debt of England, 
but who can give an adecpiatc idea of the number of millions 
of tons that annually pass through this highway ? 



THE SILENT HIGHWAY. 25 

The flow of land water through Teddington Weir is annually 
800,000,000 gallons. This is the main body of the river 
within the metropolitan area, not counting the additions it 
receives from rain-falls and other sources. 

Since the removal of the old London Bridge, the tide has 
been lower upon an average. Shoals have been brought to 
light, before unknown, and the result has been that nothing 
but a most constant and unremitting dredging has enabled 
the Thames Conservancy Board to keep the river navigable. 

It requires but a glance at Blackfriar's Bridge to determine 
how much longer it will take to remove all the gravel from the 
bed of the river, and leave the solid London clay as its bed. 

Every old bridge when removed leaves so many tons of 
gravel which eventually finds its way to the mouth of the 
Thames, and there forms shoals. 

The channel of the river thus deepened, becomes more and 
more brackish every year, and it can be but a question of 
time, as to how and from what source the inhabitants are to 
derive their water supply for drinking purposes. 

At the East India Docks the tide falls fourteen inches lower 
than formerly, and it is a fact that the low Avater at London 
Docks is lower than the low water at Sheerness, sixty miles 
below. 

At present the tide at London Bridge has a rise of 18 feet. 
This river at almost any tide can float the largest ships, being 
33 feet in depth at London Bridge. 

The river water when found at low tide near the city is 
much prized for its power of self-purification, and is much in 
requisition for sea voyages, for the reason that it contains so 
large a percentage of organic matter. 

There are few or no fish to be found in the Thames in the 
neighborhood of the city or below, owing to the impurities 
prevailing from drainage and sewage. This fact is particularly 
to be noticed in the vicinity of the town of Barking on the 
Thames, where is located the outfall for all the sewage of 
dirty London. Formerly salmon were very plentiful at the 
Nore, and the last one tliere caught sold at fifteen shillings 
per pound. 



26 THE SILENT HIGHWAY. 

The Thames embankment, which was first proposed by Sir 
Christopher Wren, the architect of St. Paul's Cathedral, is 
now almost completed. This magnificent roadway, one of the 
finest in Europe, and which gives the modern observer some 
conception of what the Appian Way or Via Sacra were in the 
palmy day of ancient Rome, is fifty feet broad, and three and 
a half feet above the highest high-water mark. The embank- 
ment, which is constructed of Portland stone, and extends on 
the Surrey side from "Westminster to Vauxhall bridge, a dis- 
tance of nearly a mile, and on the Middlesex shore from 
Westminster to Blackfriar's bridge, a distance of fully a mile. 
The embankment is lined on both sides with trees which 
throw a j)leasant shade under the summer sun, and serve 
to protect the thousands of people of both sexes, who seek in 
the evening a breath of fresh air always grateful to the tired 
and sweltering citizen. 

At ditferent points, on both sides of the river, the embank- 
ment has magnificent stone terraces with stone stairs to 
enable wayfarers, who seek transportation up and down the 
river, to get on and off the numerous ferry boats that swarm 
and ply all over the Thames from Richmond to Rotherhithe. 

A description of the Thames tunnel, now closed to the 
public, may appropriately be included in this chapter. It was 
commenced by a joint stock company in 1824, after designs by 
Sir Isambert Brunei. Early in December, 1825, the first 
horizontal shaft was sunk. The difficulties encountered in the 
construction of the great engineering work can scarcely be 
overestimated. For a distance of five hundred and forty-four 
feet all Avent well, but at this point the river burst into the 
shaft, while the workmen were at labor, filling the excavation 
entirely in fifteen minutes, but fortunately no lives were lost. 
With great difficulty the water was pumped out and work 
resumed. 

After adding fifty-two feet to the original length of the shaft, 
the turbid Thames again broke through. 

Six men by this accident were smothered in the rush of 
angry waters, the remaining laborers escaping. Thrice again 



THE SILENT HIGHWAY. 



27 



the river broke into the succeeding excavations, and at length 
the tunnel was completed to the Wapping side of the river. 

Here a shaft was sunk from the surface to meet it. In 
sinking this shaft, three distinct lines of piles, showing the 
existence of wharves below the present level of the Thames, 
were discovered. 

March 25, 1843, nineteen years after its commencement, 
this monument of British stupidity and dogged obstinacy, the 
Tunnel, was opened to the London public. As an investment 
it has never paid a dollar ; as a convenience it was a swindle 
on the general public, but for the wild Arabs of London, and 
the lowest order of shameful women, it rivaled the infamous 
Adelphi Arches as a rendezvous ; calling into existence a dis- 
tinct class known as "Tunnel Thieves," who, conscious of the 
fact that strangers would naturally visit this much lauded 
work, were always waiting in secret hiding places to plunder 
the unsuspecting \'isitor of his watch or valuables. 

To take the place of this absurd tunnel, a Thames Subway 
has been devised, starting at Tower Hill, and continuing under 
the bed of the river to a point near Blackfriar's Bridge. The 
Thames subway is in a manner similar to the Pneumatic Rail- 
way. Shafts are sunk on either side of the river, and vehicles 
constructed like a horse railway car, are used to convey pas- 
sengers to and fro under the river, for a fare of two pence per 
head. Tliese vehicles are lighted by lamps, and a conductor 
is attached to each car. Powerful engines at either end fur- 
nish the force which propels these underground vehicles. 




CHAPTER III. 




THE DOCKS, SHIPPING, AND CO^DIERCE OF THE PORT OF 

LONDON. 

jF you leave King "William Street just at the foot 
of London Bridge, and turn to the left, you will 
find your way into a grouping of streets, narrow 
and steep, a few only of which admit of car- 
riage and horse traffic. 

This is the region of the world-renowned 
London Docks, the basins which hold the great- 
est commerce known to any city on the globe ; 
a commerce before which the ancient traffic of 
Tyre, Sidon, Carthage, and Sicily, the granary 
of the ancient world, was as nothing. 

The lower stories of the houses in this district, which smell 
of tar, resin, and other merchantable commodities, are let out 
as offices, and the upper as warehouse floors ; the pavement is 
narrow and the roads are as bad as broken staves and long 
neglect can make them ; dirty boys in sailor's jackets play at 
leap frog over the street posts ; legions of wheelbarrows 
encumber the broader part of these thoroughfares ; packing 
cases stand at the doors of houses, and iron cranes and levers 
peep out from the upper stories. 

No man, it has been said, could ever tell how much money 
lies hidden away in the vaults of the Bank of England, and it 
is about as difficult to count up the tons of produce which 
London exports and imports annually. 

For instance, during one year, (1865), the number of car- 



CUSTOM HOUSE DUTIES OP LONDON. 29 

goes entered and cleared coastwise, (which besides British 
ports includes t-he shores from the Elbe to Brest,) was 30,820, 
and their tonnage, 5,263,565i 

As many as fifty thousand ships of all classes enter and 
leave the Thames in twelve months, or about seventy vessels 
per day, exclusive of all the innumerable kinds of miscellane- 
ous small craft. 

The entire French commercial navy consists of twelve thou- 
sand vessels, an aggregate of perhaps one million seven 
hundred thousand tons, a little more tlian a quarter of the 
number of ships and the same percentage of tonnage that en- 
ters and leaves this world metropolis of London. 

If tlie ships that move to and fro on the bosom of the 
Thames be supposed to average one hundred and fifty feet in 
lengtli one with another, tliey would reach, placed stem and 
stern together, upward of thirteen hundred miles, or nearly 
half way across the Atlantic. 

The Custom House duties, Avith a very low tariff for the port 
of London, during one year amounts to sixty-eight millions of 
dollars in gold, and the declared real value of exi)orts from 
London for tlie same time amounted to one hundred and sev- 
enty millions of dollars in gold. The declared real value of 
the imports registered at the huge granite custom house on 
the Thames, for the port of London, for 1869, from foreign 
and colonial jiorts, was four hundred millions of dollars in 
gold, or as much as the total value of the real estate on New 
York island in 1870. 

Englishmen are very fond of coffee it seems, for they im- 
ported tliirty million pounds of the fragrant berry in 1869. 
The choleric temper of the people may find an explanation in 
the six million pounds of pepper received in London. London 
also imported seven million gallons of rum, althougli it is su)> 
posed to be the great beer drinking city of the world. Eiglity 
tliousand gallons of gin, sixty million pounds of tea, thirty- 
eight million pounds of tobacco, nine million six hundred and 
fifty-seven thousand and thirty-four gallons of foreign wines, 
two million cwts. of raw sugar, and two million seven hundred 



80 THE DOCKS, SHIPPING, AND COMMERCE OF LONDON. 

sixty-tAvo thousand two hundred and forty-eight gallons of bran- 
dy were imported in 18G9. These articles of merchandise 
were all held in l)()nd at the London Custom House, and from 
these figures my readers may form some idea of the magnitude 
of the commerce of tins great city. 

Russia sent one tliousand three hundred vessels and received 
three lunidred and ninety-one vessels, Sweden one thousand 
one huiuh-ed and twenty-one vessels and received five hundred 
and twenty vessels, France sent one thousand four hundred 
and sixteen vessels and received one tliousand three hundred 
and eighty-two vessels, Holland sent nine hundred and twen- 
ty-four vessels and received seven hundred and fourteen ves- 
sels, Cuba sent three hundred and twelve vessels and received 
sixty-two vessels. United States sent four hundred and twelve 
vessels and received three hundred and seventeen vessels, Chi- 
na sent two hundred and eight vessels and received one hund- 
red and thirty vessels in 1869. 

I have not space here to enumerate all the petty nationalities, 
whose merchants trade with London, but the above table, ob- 
tained from the custom house authorities and therefore authen- 
tic, may serve to indicate what the trade of London is, and the 
vast interests which gather there. Tlie United States does not 
figure so conspicuously as might be expected here, the Alaba- 
mas and Floridas perhaps have something to do vrith. the pau- 
city of American commerce with the commercial metropolis of 
England. 

The most wonderful of all the London sights arc tlie huge 
artificial l)asins, bound in masses of masonry and known as 
the London Docks. No other city in the world can boast of 
such magnificent artificial basins, where millions of tons of 
shipping can be accommodated. It is enough to make an 
American feel humiliated to pay a visit to these wonderful 
docks, and to be forced to compare them with the rotten 
wooden wharves Avhich environ the great city of New York, 
and Avliich are honored with the title of docks. 

The ])riiicipal docks of London are those wliich I give be- 
low Avith their water areas, cost, and the number of vessels 
wliich they accommodate : 



WATER AREA. 

75 acres, 




LAND AREA. 

150 acres. 


KO OF VES- 
SELS ACC. 

200 


COST. 

£610,000 


40 " 




100 


u 


320 


900,000 


90 " 




295 


(( 


1104 


1,600,000 


18 " 




31 


« 


112 


380,000 


15 " 




24 


t( 


160 


2,252,000 


71 " 




40 


a 


300 


423,000 


90 " 


1- 


•2 mile frontage, 400 


1,072,871 


90 miles long. 


16 acres, 




2,000,000 


8 1-2 miles 


long, 




300 





THE COMMERCIAL AND LONDON DOCKS. 31 



Commercial Docks, 
London Docks, 
West India Docks, 
East India Docks, 
St. Catharine's Docks, 
Surrey Docks and Canal, 
Victoria Docks, 

Brentford Dock and Canal, 

Regent's Canal, 

The Commercial Dock is chiefly used by vessels in the oil, 
corn, timber, and tobacco trade ; and there is floating space 
for fifty thousand loads of lumber, and the warehouses afford 
storage for one hundred and fifty thousand quarters of corn, 
while the yards of the company will hold four million pieces 
of deals, and staves without number. The lock in the South 
Commercial Dock is two hundred and twenty feet long l>y for- 
ty-eight feet wide, with a depth of twenty-two feet, and will 
admit vessels of twenty-six feet draught. Five hundred thou- 
sand tons of shipping have been received here in a year, rei> 
resenting about one thousand five hundred vessels of various 
tonnage. 

The London Docks extend from East Smithfield to Shadwell 
and have twelve thousand four hundred and forty feet of 
wharf frontage, and are intended principally for the reception 
of vessels laden with wines, brandy, tobacco, and rice. 

There are forty warehouses for the storage of merchandise 
of every description, couvenient in arrangement, and magnifi- 
cent in design and execution. The cubical capacity of the 
warehouses is two hundred and forty-nine thousand four hund- 
red and thirty tons ; two Inmdred and thirty-one thousand one 
hundred and forty-seven for dry goods, and eighteen thousand 
two hundred and eighty-three for wet goods. 

The tobacco house in these docks sends its very strong odor 
all over the Thames, and it is as good as the flavor of a Ha- 
vana cigar almost to smell this huge warehouse as you pass 
by on the river in a steamboat. This warehouse is the largest 



32 



THK DOCKS, SHIPPING, AND COMMERCE OF LONDON. 



of its kind in the world, covering five acres of ground, and is 
rented by the government at foui-teen thousand pounds a year 
of the conii)any, for all the London Docks are owned Ly stock 
companies, and this perhaps explains the economy displayed 
in their construction, and their useful adaptability to the com- 
merce of London. 

The tobacco warehouse will contain twenty-four thousand 
hogsheads of tobacco, each hogshead holding one thousand 




ENTRANCE TO DOCKS. 



two hundred pounds, the total capacity being equal to thirty 
thousand tons of general merchandise. 

Under the London Docks are tlie finest vaults in the world, 
vast catacombs of the precious vintages garnered from every 
famous vineyard in the glol)e. The vaults in the London 
docks cover an area of eighteen acres, and afford accommoda- 
tion for eighty tliousand pipes of wine. One of the vaults 
alone is seven acres in extent, and the tea warehouses will 



THE WINE VAULTS, AND " TASTING PERMITS," 33 

hold one hundred and twenty thousand chests of that fragrant 
herb. 

To go into these vast wine vaults is indeed a treat. It is 
like entering a City of the dead, only that instead of the skel- 
etons of human beings piled on top of each other, you find an 
Aceldama of casks, pipes, barrels, hogsheads, and butts, 
bonded and stored tier upon tier, until the eye becomes 
wearied, and a man wonders how all those costly vintages can 
ever be consumed. 

There is no difference between night and day in these dim 
deep recesses under the London streets. The vaults are only 
separated from the bed of the Thames by a thick wall, and at 
noonday, gas has to be turned on to light the way to the enor- 
mous storehouses of wine and brandy. Passes arc granted by 
the companies and the owners of liquors on bond, called " tast- 
ing permits," which gives the privilege to the visitor to ask an 
attendant for a sample of any wine, or wines and liquors 
that he may choose to taste. 

Armed with one of these permits I visited the London 
docks one day with a friend, and we penetrated the gloomy 
cavern's entrance, and finally found our way to a part of the 
vaults where were stored thousands of pipes of the delicious 
golden browli vintage of Xeres de la Frontera. 

My friend was one of those wandering Americans you arc 
always sure to light upon abroad, who makes your acquain- 
tance whether you like it or not, and who cries out frantically 
whenever he sees a foreign flag. 

" By Gad— Sir, that flag is all good enough in its way — but 
1 tell you it does not come up to our flag of beauty and glory — 
now I'll put it to you — does it ? " 

A grimy looking cellar man who smelled like an old claret 
bottle that had long remained uncorked, wearing an apron an I 
carrying a wooden hammer for tapping, came to us and said, 
politely, on presentation of our orders : 

"The borders are werry correct, sir. "Would you like t) 
try a little old Sherry, sir, fine as a sovrin and sparkling as 
the sun ? " 

3 



34 



THE DOCKS, SHIPPING, AND COMMERCE OF LONDON. 



" Well, I don't care if I do take a little sherry — I don't 
think it will hurt me — do you think it Avill ? " said my friend. 

lie then took about half a pint of fine golden sherry, and 
after taking it he seemed all at once to discover a new beauty 
in the architecture of the vaults, although he had condemned 
the place when he entered it, as a " chilly, stinking .hole, not 
fit for a dog, by Gad, sir." 

While he was delivering himself most eloquently on the 
merits of the sherry, I had an opjiortunity to look about me 
and examine the i)lace. 




I UO.N T THINK IT WILL IIL'KX SIE. 



Different jjarties were going from cask to cask, from hogs- 
head to hogshead, like my friend, trying each vintage, and 
tasting brandies, and gins, and wines to their heart's content. 

I thought to myself, what a splendid boon these vaults 
would l)e to a New York corner loafer, without restriction and 
with full liberty to drink till he died likt) a soldier, contending 
to tiie last against the enemy which deprives a man of his 



HOISTING AND DISCHARGING CARGOES. 35 

brains. The attendants here never object to the amount called 
for, and a tasting permit admits to all the privileges. 

"We were now standing in an arched alcove devoted exclu- 
sively to the wine's of Madeira, Teneriffe, and the Canary Isl- 
ands. Some of these huge casks held as many as seven hund- 
red gallons, and the rich, old, musty and fruity odors that came 
from them were truly revivifying to my friend, who was loqua- 
cious under the influence of the sherry. 

" This ere sexshin is for the Madeery," said the bung star- 
ter. " "Will you try a little Madeery, sir ? " said he. 

" Well I dori't care if I do take a little Madeira — I don't 
think it will hurt me. Now I put it to you this way — I 
don't think it will hurt me if I am moderate ? " 

He seemed to relish this heavy and fruity wine very much, 
and before he left the alcove he had " tasted " a good deal of 
the Canary also smacking his lips lusciously. 

There is considerable skill displayed in the building of the 
arclies of the range of vaults, and with the dim lights of the 
sperm lamps, burnings— as it is not deemed safe to have gas in 
the vaults where spirits are stored — the vaults very much 
resemble the crypts under the cloisters in "Westminster Abbey, 
or the vaults under St. Paul's. 

The method for hoisting cargoes from the holds of ships to 
the grading, which is level with the opening in the vaults is 
very perfect. The opening in the wall of the basin or docks 
is eighteen feet high, and large hogsheads can be hoisted and 
lowered at once into the vaults instead of being temporarily 
deposited on the quay. 

In the old times before steam had been discovered and 
these magnificent docks had been built, an East Indiaman of 
eight hundred tons took a month to discharge her cargo, or if 
of one tliousand two hundred tons, six weeks were required 
for the labor, and their goods had to be taken from Blackwall 
to London Bridge in lighters, when they were placed on the 
quay exposed to dock rats and river thieves as goods are in 
New York, where the private watchmen on the rotten wooden 
docks are generally to be found in league with the thieves. 



36 THE DOCKS, SHIPPING, AND COMMERCE OF LONDCiX. 

At St. Katharine's Docks the time occupied on an average 
in discharging a vessel of three liundred tons is eight hours, 
and for one of six luuidred tons two days and a half. In one 
instance one thousand one lunidrcd casks of tallow were dis- 
charged in six hours, but of course this was unusually rapid 
work. One of the cranes in the St. Katharine's Docks cost 
about twenty-five thousand dollars, and will raise from forty to 
sixty tons at a time. 

There is a wharf attached to the St. Katharine Docks, whicli 
Parliament compelled the company to construct at a cost of 
nearly a million of dollars, and the warehouses will contain 
one hundred and ten thousand tons of goods and merchandise. 
The depth of water in the St. Katharine's Docks is twenty- 
eight feet^at spring tide, at dead tide twenty-four feet, and at 
low water ten feet, so that vessels of eight hundred tons reg- 
ister are docked and undocked without the slightest difficulty. 
There is a water frontage and quays of one thousand five 
hundred feet in tlie St. Katharine Docks. The wharfage of 
the London Docks is one thousand two luuidred and sixty feet 
in length and nine hundred and sixty feet in breadth. The 
capital of the London Docks company is about twenty-five 
million dollars in gold, and as many as three thousand labor- 
ers are cmijloycd in the London Docks in a day. 

The walls surrounding the London Docks cost sixty-five 
thousand })ounds in construction, and all these walls are so 
high (nearly thirty feet,) that they present an impregnable 
barrier to thieves and depredators. 

The receipts for one year in the London Docks were over 
three million dollars, currency ; the salaries and wages 
amounted to about one million dollars, and the revenue cus- 
toms paid about eleven hundred thousand dollars. These figures 
show that the company is in a prosperous state, and gives the 
municipal governments of our American Athmtic cities the 
best reasons, when others which I have already enumerated 
are combined, wliy New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Portland, 
Savannah and Charleston, sliould , have stone docks to equal 
those of London and Liverpool in magnitude and solidity. 



THE WEST INDIA DOCKS. 37 

Having made a lengthened inspection of the London Docks 
I turned to leave and could not find my friend who had accom- 
panied me. After some difficulty I discovered him afar off at 
the other end of the vaults discussing with the cellarman 
what liquor he was next to taste. 

" Yer honor might just taste a little of the Hennesey Brandy 
of 1832 — it is very fine and runs down like hile." 

" By Gad, sir, the very thing — now that you mention it I 
will try a little, just a leetle Hennesey brandy. I'll put it to 
you in this way — I don't think it can hurt me — and the cellar- 
man says it's just like oil. Now I recollect that oil never 
intoxicates. I will take just the faintest tint." 

He did take the "faintest tint," perhaps a good sized glass- 
full, and he became so jolly, and affectionate, and good na- 
tured, embracing me and also the cellarman, that the latter 
personage had at last to call a cab into which my friend was 
carried, and after being propped up he was driven to his hotel. 
The cellarman said to me : 

" We 've two agents as comes 'ere sober, bless 'em, and goes 
away drunk ; but they hurts nobody but themselvdife, bless 
them." 

I went from the London Docks to the West India Docks, 
about a mile and a half distant, at the Isle of Dogs, a small 
islet in the Thames near Blackwall. These numerous basins 
and warehouses occupy three times the space of the London 
Docks, or about two hundred and ninety-five acres, with a 
canal three quarters of a mile in length as a feeder. The Im- 
port Dock is five hundred and ten feet in length, and about the 
same measurement in width. The Export Dock is about the 
same length and is about four hundred feet wide. The docks 
and warehouse are enclosed by a wall of masonry five feet 
thick, that seems as if it would endure as long as the port of 
London is open to commerce and merchandise, and the value 
of twenty millions of pounds is here stored by its owners. 

I gave an employee of the company a shilling to take me 
through, and he was not at all backward in showing me the 
treasures under the care of the company. 



38 THE DOCKS, SHIPPING, AND COMMERCE OF LONDON. 



he: ■ 
two 9 



" These arc the biggest docks in Lunimn, sir," said 
" say what they will on the other docks. We will hold 
hundred million tons of merchandise here, sir, and we will 
not be crowded at all. Why, sir, I've seen as much as two 
hundred thousand casks of sugar, five hundred thousand bags 
of coffee, fifty thousand pipes of Jimaky rum, ten thousand 
pipes of Madeery, twenty-five thousand tons of logwood, and 
lots of other things here and we were not full. 

" I've seen an acre of 'ogsheads of tibaccy, eight feet high, 
and piles of cinnamon, spices, pepper, indigo, salt pork, hides 
and leather, Hindian corn, mahogany, and sich like, and no one 
of us, sir, ever knows the walley of them, and I suppose Mr. 
Bright hiself would be more nor puzzled to tell the walley, 
and I've heard as how he has got a preshis head for figgers." 

Formerly when steamers employed paddle wheels as a 
means of locomotion, the docks were very much crowded, but 
the use of the universal screw has given much more space for 
berthways. There is, however, great risks in these docks, 
of fire, from steam vessels, and I believe the rates are much 
higher £or steam craft than for sailing vessels. Small offices 
and compact frame houses for the company's officers, revenue 
officers,warehousemen, clerks, engineers, coopers and other petty 
attachees, have been provided within the ground area of all 
these stone basins, and everything connected with the docks is 
done in a systematic and business like way that is truly wonder- 
ful. When I recollected that less than fifty years ago London 
had no inclosed docks at all, and no accommodation for shipping 
but a long and straggling line of private quays, under the 
management of firms who had no public interests to serve, 
(and in fact when the present system of docks was at first 
proposed it met with almost universal opposition, particularly 
from the interested parties,) I was amazed at the progress 
made in a half century. 

There is not such a city in the world, perhaps, for the num- 
ber of corporations, guilds, societies, and titled people, who 
derive and did derive emolument and income, of one kind or 
another, from these private quay and wharfage receipts. 



OPPOSITION TO THE NEW DOCK SYSTEM. 39 

Therefore when the citizens of London became thoroughly 
awakened to the possibility of substituting for these rotten 
old timber wliarves and tumble down old stone piers, a thor- 
ough, efiicicnt, and lasting system of dockage, the interested 
people began to clamor most hideously about their " vested 
rights." These two Avords have always stood in England as a 
safeguard to protect some oppressive or corporate interest. 

The " Tackle House " and City Porter Companies com- 
plained that if the import and export business were removed 
beyond the city limits, their right to the exclusive privilege of 
unloading and delivering all merchandise imported into the 
city would be worthless. The carmen who enjoyed a similar 
privilege and monopoly made the same complaint, and they 
stated that Christ's Hospital, an institution nmch revered by 
all Londoners, derived an income of four thousand pounds a year 
from the licenses under which they held their monopoly ; the 
watermen, wlio were then numbered by thousands, foxetold 
that the establishment of docks would deprive one half of their 
number of bread ; the lightermen stated that they liad a capi- 
tal of one hundred and twenty thousand pounds invested in 
tackle and craft, employed to transport merchandise, which 
capital would be annihilated if ships were allowed to discharge 
their cargoes on quays within docks ; the proprietors of the " le- 
gal quays " as they were called, and the " sufferance wharves," 
or wharves which held no legal title, all prophesied that the 
trade of London would be ruined at once if the new system of 
docks Avas established. 

However these people differed in some details of their griev- 
ances, they all concurred in stating that unloading ships in 
closed docks would be more expensive than discharging them 
into lighters in the river. 

On the other hand the advocates of the new system estima- 
ted on paper that the unloading of five hundred hogsheads of 
sugar from a vessel could be done in the new docks for about 
three hundred and fifty dollars of American money less than 
under the old lighterage and open quay system, to say nothing 
of the greater safety of the property thus enclosed in dock 
walls. 



40 THE DOCKS, SHIPPING AND COMMERCE OP LONDON. 

Finally, Parliament passed an act creating the new docks and 
granting a comi)ensation of four hundred and eighty-six thou- 
sand and eighty-seven pounds to the proprietors of the legal quays 
in addition to the sum of one hundred and thirty-eight thou- 
sand seven liundred and ninety-one pounds which was paid to 
persons liaving " vested rights " in the mooring claims on the 
river. Altogether the cost of the different London Docks, 
including ground purchases, etc., was about thirty millions of 
dollars. The "West India Docks were the first opened in 1802, 
and the citizens of London have, I am sure, no cause to regret 
the decision which gave them the finest and safest system of 
wharfage in the world. 

The passenger traffic, by water, which transpires daily be- 
tween London and Continental cities and towns is incalculable. 
This of course does not include the traffic almost as great be- 
tween London and American and Colonial ports. 

You can go from London to New York in a splendid state- 
room with every comfort and luxury at sea, for about one 
hundred and thirty dollars, or you can take passage in a steer- 
age, herding like a beast as best you may for about forty dol- 
lars, by steam. 

I can safely recommend the Inman Line of Steamships 
which ply between New York and Liverpool, as the best afloat, 
the most punctual and the most comfortable. This line has 
nineteen fine steamers constantly plying between Europe and 
America. 

From London to Cork the fare, first class, is about twenty- 
three English shillings, and to Dublin twelve shillings. From 
London to Edinburgh, first class, by sea, fifteen shillings. 
London to Calais, by rail and sea, twenty-five shillings, to 
Havre, eleven shillings. London to Ostend, Belgium, fifteen 
sliillings ; to Antwerp, twenty shillings ; to Hamburg, two 
pounds ; to Rotterdam one pound ; to Belfast, forty-five sliil- 
lings ; to Dundee, twenty shillings. London to Malta twelve 
pounds ; to Maderia sixteen pounds sixteen shillings ; to Opor- 
to, eight pounds eight shillings ; to Marseilles, twelve pounds 
ten shillings ; to Rio Janeiro, thirty pounds ; to St. Petersburg, 



I 



RATES OF FARES AND DOCK LABORERS. 41 

six pounds six shillings ; to Glasgow, twelve shillings ; to Liv- 
erpool, twenty shillings ; to Stockholm, eighty-four shillings ; 
to Brussels, forty-eight shillings ; to Genoa, twelve pounds ; 
Leghorn, fifteen pounds ; Naples, eighteen pounds ; Christiana' 
Norway, eighty sliillings, and Copenhagen, sixty-three shil- 
lings. 

I give these fares as I believe it may be of some use to 
Americans, who design to travel, to know the correct rates 
of Continental travel. It is much pleasanter to travel to tlie 
continent by sea from London than by rail, the accommoda- 
tions are better, the views of the best. Tliere is no hurry, you 
may get your meals regularly, it is more healthful and 'cer- 
tainly much cheaper, as the above fares are all for first class 
passages, and it is easy to obtain second or third class accom- 
modations for a very great deal less money. 

In concluding this chapter on the Port of London, I may 
say that it is almost impossible to name a place for which pas- 
sage cannot be obtained, by sea from London, and vessels are 
leaving daily and hourly for their various destinations, from the 
many wharves and docks that line the Thames between Lon- 
don and Westminster bridges, a distance of two miles, on the 
river. 

Thirty thousand men find employment, daily, as laborers, in 
the London Docks. Men who have been reduced by want, 
misfortune, or by drunkeness, find in these vast commercial 
reservoirs, a precarious means of subsistence, earnino- from 
eighteen pence to two shillings a day, half of which generally 
goes for beer, or potations of a heavier and moi^ spirituous 
kind. This kind of labor is unskilled, and has for its propul- 
sion mere nianual strength, so that, when a man fails in every- 
thing else, he may possibly succeed as a dock laborer. The 
public houses frequented by the laborers are situated in the 
dark alleys and crowded courts near the river, and all of tliem 
partake of the brutal, low appearance which distinguishes the 
London coal heaver and dock lifter. 



CHAPTER lY. 
PALACES OF LONDON. 







ONDON is studded with palaces some 
of which were constructed by Roy- 
alty itself — some of which were con- 
fiscated by royalty, and others again 
were bought by royalty from the no- 
bles of England, or from those per- 
sons who had amassed great wealth. 
The Court of St. James is a household word among diplomats, 
and is used as a threat by ambassadors at "Vienna, or perhaps as 
a phrase of mediation at Washington, St. Petersburg, or Paris, 
but generally this name is used by belligerent envoys with 
threat and menace at Constantinople, Athens, Honduras, or 
Lisbon. English statecraft and diplomacy always tempers the 
wind to the shorn lamb, and an English Cabinet never fails to 
measure the strength of a nation before trying conclusions 
with it. 

Even the Sultan himself, and he is by common consent sup- 
posed to 1)0 a very sick man, could pass the dirty looking pile 
of St. James palace at the lower end of Pall Mall, near St. 
James street, without a tremor, and the only signs of royalty 
or power are the bear skin caps and red coats of a couple of 
guardsmen, who walk up and down with their muskets at a 
support, in a most melancholy and bored manner before the 
gates. 

This is one of the chief residences of royalty in the metrop- 
olis. In 1532, his majesty by the Grace of God, King Henry 



ST. JAMES AND WHITEHALL. 43 

the Eighth, cast his eyes upon St. James Hospital, a place set 
apart for lepers, fourteen of whom were residing there at the 
time, and being convinced of the healthfulness of the situa- 
tion, the inmates were driven forth, a small pension given to 
each, and on the site of the hospital for physical lepers, this 
moral leper erected what is now known as the palace of St. 
James, for the reception of the unfortunate but giddy Anne 
Boleyn. 

During the reigns of Mary and Elizabeth tlie palace was 
deserted, but with the advent of the Stuarts, St. James became 
a royal nursery. 

The ill-fated Charles the First had a passionate fondness for 
this palace, and on the morning of his execution attended 
divine service in the chapel which lie had fitted up. 

After the restoration, James II furnished St. James at great 
expense ; and from this period St. James became with hardly 
an intermission the abode of royalty. George the Second died 
here mumbling. George TV was born, and passed much of 
his time here. As a royal residence it has fallen away from 
its ancient splendor and is now only used on occasions of 
state solemnity ; yet it is one of the best planned palaces in 
Europe for comfort, and possesses a fine gallery of paintings. 

Whitehall, or the palace that is known by that name, was 
formerly called York House, and for three centuries before the 
time of Cardinal Wolsey, was the residence of the Archbishop 
of Canterbury. 

After the death of Wolsey its name was changed to White- 
hall, from a large hall in the building painted entirely white. 
Wolsey fitted up the palace in a style of grandeur never 
equaled, much less excelled by any other subject of the Eng- 
lish crown, and being occupied by the king on the demise of 
Wolsey, it was called the King's Palace of Westminster. 

When Queen Elizabeth died it was refitted by King James, 
and enlarged — but was destroyed by fire in 1619. Immedi- 
ately after its destruction James determined to rebuild it, and a 
portion of the palace was completed at a cost of fifteen thousand 
pounds, but such extravagance could not be allowed in those 



44 PALACES IN LONDON. 

days, parliament refusing to grant money to continue the build- 
ing, and the fanatical monarch, whose memory has survived 
because of his hatred of tobacco, was forced to suspend oper- 
ations for want of funds. 

The ceiling of the banqueting-room, a work of Rubens and 
for which he was paid three thousand pounds, is said to be one 
of the finest efforts of that most gifted artist's pencil. 

In the time of the Protector Cromwell, one of the rarest 
collections of paintings ever made in the world, and of 
immense value — which had been accumulated here by succes- 
sive kings, was ordered to be sold by Cromwell in accordance 
with the Puritan belief that to possess paintings or statuary 
was conducive of image worship in the owner. Charles the 
First was really a great admirer of works of art, and had 
he lived he would no doubt have made "Whitehall the finest 
palace of Europe. 

Cromwell occupied Whitehall as a residence for his family 
after the execution of King Charles I, for biitcher as he was, 
and strict republican as he pretended to be, he was not above 
enjoying the good things of this life, and despite his cadaver- 
ous countenance he could appreciate a soft bed and a tender 
piece of roast beef with the jolliest of cavaliers. 

On the 10th of April, 1691, a fire broke out in the apart- 
ments of the bad Duchess of Portsmouth who occupied a 
portion of Whitehall, (this woman was a mistress of Charles 
II,) and in 1698 the entire structure was consumed with the 
exception of the banqueting-hall, and nothing but the walls 
were left standing. 

This hall was altered to a chapel by King George II, and 
since that time has been used for that purpose, the clergyman 
always being a royal chaplain. Over the door is a bust of the 
founder, and the brilliant frescos of the ceiling pieces of Ru- 
bens are all that is left of the once magnificent palace of 
Whitehall. 

The residence of the Queen, when in London, is generally 
supposed to be Buckingham Palace, a long gloomy looking 
building in St. James Park, not a stones' throw from the 



% 



BUCKINGHAM PALACE. 47 

Marlilc Arch in Hyde Park or "Westminster Abbey. The same 
big flashy looking soklicrs in red coats, and hideous grenadier 
bearskins are to be seen marching up and down opposite this 
palace gate just as they do about St. James Palace, or at the 
Horse Guards in Parliament street. 

St. James Park is a pretty place with fine shady trees, and 
here in the mall or wide walk of the park was played a cen- 
tury ago, and still farther back in the days of paint, powder, 
and patches, and garden masquerades, the game of " pell mell." 

Buckingham Palace, though much frequented by the Queen, 
and situated pleasantly as far as appearances go, is not a 
healthy place of residence at all. The Queen frequently has 
complained of its dampness, she having often contracted bad 
colds there. This I have on the authority of her former chap- 
lain. 

George the lY had a Dutch predeliction for low ceilings, 
and as he never lived on good terms with his wife, whom he 
used to call a Fat Dutch Hog, no accommodations were made 
for Queen Caroline his spouse, in Buckingham Palace. 

The palace was occupied by this monarch, for whom it was 
built, in 1825. This king was one of the most profligate of men 
and a roue — and yet had the reputation of being the finest 
gentleman in Europe, but he never spared man in his rage 
nor woman in his lust. 

John, Duke of Buckingham, lived in a house on the site of 
the palace, in 1703, from which circumstance it has derived 
its name. 

I had special permission to visit this palace while the Queen 
was absent on her summer tour in Scotland ; it being a great 
favor to be admitted, and it was only by great perseverance 
and difficulty that I obtained entrance to the royal abode. 

One bright morning I called about ten o'clock, and after 
presenting my order of admittance was allowed to enter. 

I was bewildered by its sumptuous magnificence. Fancy a 
noble hall surrounded with a double row of marble columns, 
every one composed of a single piece of veined Carrara mar- 
ble, with gilded bases and capitals ; the tout ensemble being 



48 PALACES OF LONDON. 

a splendid perspective of over one hundred and fifty feet. The 
steps of the grand, staircase are also of the purest marble. 
The Library, Council room, and Sculpture gallery are all most 
beautifully decorated. 

The Library is used for a waiting room for deputations, 
which as soon as the Queen is ready to receive them pass 
across the Sculpture Gallery into the hall, and thence ascend 
by the Grand Stairway, through the Ante-Room and the Green 
Drawing-room to the Throne room. The Library and adjoining 
rooms are fitted up in a most gaudy fashion, there being a sad 
want of taste displayed, cither by her Majesty or her uphol- 
sterer, but by which I am not able to say. 

The Sculpture Gallery contains the busts of leading states- 
men of all countries, and chief among them I noticed one of 
Prince Albert, the late husband of the Queen, mounted on a 
fine pedestal. Busts of all the members of the royal family, 
male and female, are also here. That of the Princess Louisa 
is a charming, innocent looking English face ; she is said to 
be deeply in love with a rich Catholic nobleman of the Duke 
of Norfolk's family. 

The Picture Gallery has fine skylights so as to throw a 
shaded light on the works of art below, and here are to be 
found the master pieces of the Dutch and Flemish schools, 
gems of Reynolds, Watteau, Titian, Albert Durer, Rembrandt, 
Teniers, Ostade, Cuyps, Wouvermans,and others, formerly the 
collection in great part of George IV. 

The Yellow Drawing room, a superb apartment, has a series 
of paintings in panels of the royal family, there being full 
length pictures of Queen Victoria, looking very fat, with the 
crown upon her head, and Prince Albert in his costume of 
Knight of the Garter, a dress which is supremely ridiculous in 
these days when none but priests and academicians wear such 
drapery. 

The Throne Room is a gaudy looking apartment, very large 
and spacious, and like all the rooms in Buckingham palace 
having a very low ceiling, the prevailing decoration being cur- 
tains of striped satin, and the alcoves are hung in rich crimson 



queen's library. 49 

velvet relieved or rather bedizened %vith an nearly obscured 
gilding. William TV, the sailor king, hated this palace for its 
ugliness and discomfort, and this all the more that he was 
used to sleeping in a hammock aboard his own frigate. 

The Marble Arch, an immense pile of stone now at the corner 
of Piccadilly and Hyde Park, formerly occupied the central 
position in this building, and was erected in its present posi- 
tion at a cost of thirty-one thousand pounds. 

When the present Queen had her first child the palace was 
found so uncomfortable that she had to have the nursery re- 
moved to the attic, and there, while the royal child was getting 
its teeth cut, the Lord Chamberlain of England, ^\iio had 
charge of the improvements, was boiling glue and making 
French polish in the basement, so that altogether the queen of 
the greatest nation of the earth, subsequent to her honeymoon, 
was no better housed than a poor family in New York, dwell- 
ing in a respectable tenement house. 

Parliament, however, was kind enough to grant the sum of 
one hundred and fifty thousand pounds to alter and repair the 
building, and accordingly the palace was made habitable for 
her Majesty. 

The Ball Room is one hundred and thirty-nine feet in length. 
The Supper Room is seventy-six b}" sixty feet — with a prome- 
nade gallery one hundred and nine feet in lengUi, and twen- 
ty-one feet wide. There is a riding school attached, with a 
mews or stable for horses ; here the state carriages and coaches 
are kept at an expense, for flunkies, grooms, masters of the 
horse, stable boys, feed for horses and labor, of thirty-six thou- 
sand pounds, or over two hundred thousand dollars annually. 

I was allowed as a great favor to inspect the Queen's lil)rary, 
which is very handsomely fitted up, and wherever the oye rcsted 
for a moment it was sure to find a picture or bust of Prince 
All>ert. There were a number of small tables of inlaid ivory, 
mother of pearl, and gold, covered with handsomely bound 
volumes of Shakespeare and otlier English poets. I also saw a 
finely bomid €opy of the Memoirs ofthe Queen, wliich it is 
supposed was written by l>er Majesty. This is a mistake, how- 



60 



PALACES OP LONDON. 



ever, as tlie entire book was written Ijy a secretary of hers 
from some scanty notes provided by her, and from personal 
recollections. The Queen was nine months dictating the work 
before its publication. The Queen was in the habit of sitting 
four hours a day giving these reminiscences of her husband, 
and during this time she always had a glass of sherry and a 
biscuit by her side. 

Very little is known of her Majesty outside of the British 
Isles. Almost every other female sovereign has publicity given 

to all her secret actions, 
and her private life is dis- 
cussed with great person- 
al freedom, in the cafes 
and clubs. A thousand 
stories have been set 
afloat and circulated in 
regard to Madam Isabel- 
la, lately Queen of Spain, 
and but a few of them 
are true. Rochcfort in 
his papers, "The Lan- 
tern" and the "Marsel- 
laise," has not hesitated 
to i)0ur columns of abuse 
upon tlie head of the Em- 
press Eugenie, a lady 
whose principal fault is a 
fondness for low necked 
dresses. 
Two women have hitherto escaped this kind of slander, and 
these two are the Empress of Austria and Queen Victoria. 
The reason is palpable in the case of the Empress of Austria; 
she is an imperial lady to discuss whose private life it would 
be dangerous if done on Austrian territory. 

In regard to the Queen of England, the reason why silence 
is kept in relation to her private life is because of a sneaking 
regard for tlie manners, customs, and good opinions of titled 
individuals among most American travelers. 




POBTRAIT OF THE QUEEN. 



queen's seclusion. 61 

The Queen has been a good wife and mother, hut in these 
two qualities she is more than equaled by thousands of Amer- 
ican women. She is no better and no worse than the average 
married woman ; has her faults, her weaknesses, and her good 
qualities, and it is among her own people that her failings find 
their loudest trumpeters. 

In honestly dealing with these stories I shall not stop to 
give the gross yarns which are spun by the Jenkinses of the 
press, who make what they call an honest penny by chronicling 
all the loose street scandal that is poured into their ears. 

The London Times, the leading paper of England, has on 
several occasions soundly berated the Queen for her continued 
seclusion from the public, her exalted position being, it is said, 
her only excuse, and subsequent to the death of Prince Albert 
this seclusion was continued so long that the shopkeepers and 
tradesmen who profit by the receptions, festivals, and gaieties 
of the court, were loud in their complaints of what they 
deemed to be an overstrained and extravagant grief. 

Several leading modistes or dress makers were obliged to- 
give up business, owing to the Queen having closed her draw- 
ing rooms ; murmuring loudly that they had been ruined by 
her Majesty, as their principal business was to make dresses for 
the ladies of rank who have nothing else to do but go to balls, 
parties, and drawing-room receptions Avhen invited. Indeed 
for the past three years there has been a growing dissatisfaction 
with her Majesty, and sad stories are told of that royal lady in 
the English capital — chiefly the shopkeepers were enraged — 
although this class of people are usually the most loyal — then 
the Fenian affair came and was added as fuel to the general 
discontent. 

But the worst remains to be told, and it is ^vith no feeling 
of pleasiu-e that I am compelled to lift the veil. 

The story is everywhere prevalent that the seclusion of the 
Queen is owing to her fondness for liquor ; this statement has 
never been openly promulgated in the papers, but is contin- 
ually hinted at obscurely in the more liberal organs. It is 
boldly spoken of by private individuals that the temper of her 
4 



62 PALACES OF LONDON. 

Majesty has of late years become very irascible and is some- 
times ungovernable, and the cause is attributed to drink and 
its consequent delirium which has seized upon this unfortunate 
lady. 

I was told by a clergyman who had it direct from the wife 
of a former chaplain of her Majesty, that the Queen was in the 
habit of drinking half a pint of raw liquor per day. The effects 
of these liberal potations arc making visible havoc in her once 
comely face. I saw her thrice, and her inflamed face and swollen 
eyes gave her all the appearance of an inebriate. Perhaps 
the trouble caused by her scapegrace of a son, the Prince of 
Wales, who, without doubt, is as reckless a scamp as ever ex- 
isted, has had much to do with his mother's present condition, 
and has driven her to drinking. 

It is also notorious that the Queen has chosen for her body 
servant one John Brown, a raw boned, robust, and coarse 
Highlander, and clings to him with more warmth and tenacity 
than becomes a lady who carried her sorrow for a deceased 
husband previously to such an extravagant pitch. 

This John Brown whom I saw is over six feet in height, a 
powerful looking fellow ; but he has a face that would find favor 
in the eyes of very few women. He was formerly a body servant 
of Prince Albert, and was always an attendant on him in his 
hunting and fishing excursions. The Queen took notice of him 
at Balmoral, her summer residence in Scotland, and here she 
made a great pet of him. 

After the death of Prince Albert the Queen attached Brown 
to her person, and ever since he has constantly attended her. 

It is the custom of the Queen to have herself pushed around 
the grounds of her lodge at Balmoral in a perambulator or 
hand carriage when she visits that charming spot. 

The person selected for this duty was the lucky John Brown. 
Day after day he might be seen pushing around the spacious 
lawn, the Majesty of England. 

During her hours of idleness Brown is always allowed to con- 
verse with the Queen in a familiar manner, and it is said pre- 



LUCKY JOHN BROWN. 



53 



sumes on her gracious condescension more than her noblest 
subject would dare to do. 

When the Queen takes her seat in her perambulator it might 
often occur that a servant would spring forward with a lowly 
reverence to assist the royal lady, but in every instance the un- 
fortunate flunkey would receive a rebuking frown, and in a 
moment after might have to undergo the mortification of a 
sneering laugh from Brown, who at this crisis would make his 




JOHN BROWN EXERCISING THE QUEEN. 



appearance — strolling in a leisurely fashion toward the per- 
ambulator, and stretching his long Celtic legs, his arms full of 
warm wraps in which he proceeds to enfold the person of the 
Queen, with as much seeming fondness as if he were the hus- 
band instead of the Ioav lackey of royalty, without polish and 
breeding ; then in addition to the silent rebuke of the Queen the 
offending servant Avould hear from Brown some such remark 
as " I say my douce laddie, dinna ya offer yer sarviccs till her 



64 PALACES OF LONDON. 

Majesty asks ya fur them. Dinna ye be sticking yer finger in 
till anoother miin's haggis or ye moon be scalded." 

" That will do Brown," the Queen would say to prevent a 
scene which would be sure to take place were Brown's violent 
temper not curbed in time to prevent an explosion, for the 
tall Highland gillie is no respecter of persons, and cares very 
little for royalty except in the person of its chief representa- 
tive. 

It is a current anecdote in the Pall Mall clubs, that the 
Queen's cousin, the Duke of Cambridge, who is also the com- 
mander-in-chief of the British Army, having one day desired an 
audience with the Queen of a private nature, waited upon her 
at Buckingham Palace and presented his card like any other 
private citizen. He was desired to wait, and did so until he 
became tired, and finally he was admitted to the presence, and 
was somewhat astonished to find the servant, John Brown, in 
the room. 

The Duke being a member of the royal family did not hesi- 
tate to say to her majesty in a respectful way : 

" Will your Majesty be so kind as to ask your footman to 
leave the saloon, I desire to speak to you on a matter of im- 
portance, privately." 

" Very well, you may speak without intrusion," said the 
Queen, turning her head slightly to the window where her ser- 
vant stood with his back turned coolly upon the Queen's cousin, 
" there is no one here but Brown, he is very discreet." 

Finding that the Highlander could not be prevailed upon to 
leave the room, the Duke made a virtue of necessity and pro- 
ceeded to state the purport of his visit. The Queen engaged 
in conversation with her cousin, and some minutes having 
elapsed the conversation turned upon different subjects. The 
Duke was relating a joke about the Clubs for the edification of 
the Queen, in which a noble person was made to assume a 
ridiculous position, when all at once he was interrupted with 
a peal of coarse and irreverent laughter, which rang through 
the apartments, and the Duke turning around with a thrill of 



A GOOD STORY. 55 

horror and astonishment, heard Brown scream out while he 
held his sides to contain his mad mirth : 

" Oh ! oh ! What a d — d Me that fellow must have been." 

The Duke for a moment stood petrified with horror, an un- 
pleasant tremor ran down the small of his back, and then being 
seized with a sudden idea, he took his hat and making a low 
reverence left the apartment as the Queen said in an irritable 
tone : 

" Oh ! never mind, it's only Brown." 

The story was too good to keep, and in a few days it was 
known all over London. 

On the day that the Queen opened Blackfriars bridge she 
rode in a state carriage with Brown behind her, and the act 
was so flagrant that when the procession passed through the 
Strand, the Queen was openly hissed by the people who stood 
on the sidewalks and saw the burly form of the Scotsman in 
the carriage, so close to her Majesty. 

I leave facts to speak for themselves, there is no need of com- 
ment. The great rival of Punch is a paper called the Toma- 
hawk, published in Fleet street, and which is edited with fear- 
less ability. The chief artist is a Matthew Morgan who excels 
all others of his craft in London for the beauty and spirit of 
his cartoons. Well, one day the Tomahawk appeared with a 
large two paged cartoon, in which the queen was pictured in 
her perambulator, and the tall form of Brown behind pushing 
the vehicle, while he leaned over the back and looked with an 
affectionate leer into the face of the sovereign of England. 
There was no inscription at the bottom of the picture, but it 
was so truthful and telling, that every person who looked, saw 
the whole scandalous story at a glance. Three editions of this 
number of the Tomahawk were sold in a few days, and in the 
corner of the picture the daring artist did not hesitate to sign 
his initials, " M. M." It is sufficient to state that no proceed- 
ings were taken, nor was a suit of libel brought against the 
editors who publish the paper. 

I have here only recounted facts well known in England, 
and I set them down without malice or extenuation. 



t «.,- ^^-' «-►- J 




*-/ tt 



-^ i 



56 



PALACES OF LONDON. 



The salary or income of Queen Victoria is, I believe, about 
five thousand two hundred dollars a day, including Sundays, 
for which she also receives her regular stipend. Like other 
sovereigns, slie does not toil or spin, yet the people must pay 
the bills all the same. Being of a very economical and thrifty 
disposition, it is supposed that her Majesty will leave a fortune 
of many millions of pounds to her scapegrace son when she 
dies, that is to say, if he has common decency enough too 
wait for her decease, and ceases to outrage her feelings to 
much. 

Queen Victoria was born May 24th, 1819, and is conse- 
quently in her fifty-second year. 





CHAPTER y. 

HIDDEN DEPTHS. 

INDING it necessary to have a companion 
with me who had a perfect knowledge of 
the EngHsh MetropoHs, I paid a visit to 
the headquarters of the police in the Old 
Jewry, and procured from Inspector Bai- 
ley, the Chief of Police, the aid of a de- 
tective to accompany me in my nightly 
adventures. Shortly after midnight Ser- 
geant Moss and myself passed through Gracechurch into Fen- 
church street, by towering warehouses, and along xUdgate into 
High street, Whitechapel. Until we got well up into White- 
chapel we had not met more than three or four persons, and 
they were principally individuals who had taken more ale or 
strong liquor than was good for their equilibrium. One person, 
who was evidently out of his latitude, accosted the detective 
and demanded of him, in a menacing but rather ludicrous way : 
" I s'ay ole fel', whish ish Goodman's Feelsh ? I wansli to go 
to Somshseet sthreeths. Goodman's Feelsh, ole boy. Show 
we waysh and give shixpensh, ole fel ? " 

" Go along and turn off to your left, and wnen you get home 
eat an onion, and it will do you good p'raps," said he, as ho 
tried to dodge the drunken fellow, who seemed well dressed, 
and had some jewelry on his person. 

" Eesh an onionsh. Sir, yer a gentlesmansh — ole boy. 
Blesh you. Blesh you," and he staggered away into the dark- 
ness, rolling like a yawl-boat in the breakers. 



68 HIDDEN DEPTHS. 

We turned ofT the Whitechapel road into Baker' street, up 
Charles into Wellington street. The neighborhood was a poor 
desolate one, and every building, and every stone in the street, 
with the offal in the gutters, spoke of poverty and wretched- 
ness. 

Now and then a policeman spoke to us and looked sharply 
at me, but always tliey seemed civil and obliging. 

The district we were now traversing was a kind of debatable 
land between Whitechapel and Bethnal Green. The streets, 
or rather lanes, ran across and along at angles and in circles 
of a perfect maze tending to confound ways that were well 
calculated to puzzle a stranger. 

The lanes were, with few exceptions, not more than two or 
three hundred feet long, and the odor from the cellars and lodg- 
ing houses was miasmatic. Shouts and yells and curses came 
from drunken male brutes who passed us, and now and then a 
wretched looking outcast of a woman, hideous with filth and 
bloated with gin, stole like a shadow from some of the low 
public houses that were, in accordance with the beer-house act, 
putting up their shutters. 

A woman passed us with a stone bottle in one hand and a 
herring in the other, while we stood looking up and down the 
narrow street. Her eyes were bloodshot and her face seamed 
with dissipation and wretchedness, while she grasped the stone 
bottle hard, and seemed ready to defend her precious property 
with her life. 

" Wot have you got there," said my companion seizing the 
stone jug and holding it to his nose. The woman was al- 
most frenzied at this attempt, as she believed it was, to deprive 
her of what was far dearer to her than her life. " Give me 
back my gin! " she screamed, and dashed forward like a tigress 
to claw his eyes out. The sergeant seemed satisfied, and hand- 
ed her back the stone vessel with a motion of disgust. 

" That'll do, ole lady," said he, " I'd rather you'd drink 
that White Satan nor me. I pitys yer precious witles, that's 
hall, when you drinks it. Where do you live ? " 

" I live's in ' Purty Bill's lodgin.' I'll show it to you for a 



AN EXPLORATION. 59 

brown. Come along." We followed her for a short distance, 
and now and then, as we passed the doorways and courts, 
some low blackguard would vent a little of his vile or rough 
humor upon *our devoted heads, merely to keep his intellect 
in play. 

" I say, ye pair of duffers, give us tuppence to get a pot o' 
beer, wont ye ; come here, and I'll cash yer check hif you 'ave 
no small change," said a cut-throat looking rascal of large 
build who was lying across a door that seemed to open into the 
earth somewhere. He half rose ; fell back on the broken cav- 
ern door stupefied with liquor, and began to snore like a wild 
beast gorged with blood. 

" This is an awful district, sir," said the detective. " They 
doesn't stand on ceremony with you here." 

We passed further down the dark street, and a very dark 
street it was. The atmosphere was very different from that 
which hung over London Bridge. The air was noisome, and 
the collected offal in the gutters sent up a frightful stench to 
the heavens. At the end of the street was a cul de sac, and 
before we came to it my conductor stopped at a passage, dim 
under the midnight sky, which ran back for some distance ; I 
could not tell how far, owing to the darkness. 

We passed into the court, which seemed to yawn wider as 
one progressed, between three-storied, tumble-down, dirty brick 
buildings, and finally we found ourselves in a yard about a 
hundred feet square, from the opposite side of whose buildings 
clothes lines depended covered with canvass jackets, ragged 
highlows, aprons, and two or three sou'westers, beside a lot of 
female articles of under-linen. There were barrows, hand 
carts, small jackass carts and baskets, with a few empty bar- 
rels piled up in a confused mass in the corner of the yard. Cab- 
bage leaves, bones of fish and animals, potato skins — the re- 
mains of carniverous appetites — were strewed all round. 

The detective had by this time lit a lantern which he had 
concealed in his breast, and thus I was enabled to look around 
me. He said, " This is a rum spot ; but never mind, it's safe 
enough. Now dy'e see that cellar — that's where we are a 
goin' to spend an hour or two. Come along." 



60 HIDDEN DEPTHS. 

He pointed in the direction of the cellar, or rather an open- 
ing in the ground, at the further corner of the yard, from 
whose bowels issued slanting streaks of light, shouts of laugh- 
ter, and yells indicative of mad revelry. Groping our way 
carefully over the heaps of rubbish, and around the vehicles 
and barrels, we arrived at the cellar, which had for an opening 
an aperture about six feet wide by five feet in length. The 
broken wooden stairs leading to the bottom had some fifteen 
steps. 

We descended and found the door at the lowest step barring 
the entrance. It was fastened, and had a dirty, impenetrable 
pane of glass as a watchhole for the use of those inside, so that 
nothing could be seen from the outside of the door. We gave 
the door a kick, and then the shouting and laughing seemed 
to stop very suddenly, and there was a hustling and running 
about inside which betokened preparation. 

A face appeared at the pane of glass, and, after a scrutiny 
of a minute or two, the door went back on its hinges with a 
grating sound. A big bullet-head protruded itself, and a voice 
said : 

" Who is that ere ? Wot does you want, and who the d — 1 
send you at this time o' night a disturbin' of honest people in 
their comfortable beds ? " 

" Bill, its ' Faking Johnny' as wants to hold a few moments 
conversation with you. The queen has just sent me with a 
patent of nobility for you, from Buckingham Palace. You are 
to be made a barronnight right hofif when you reforms," said 
the detective, in a jocular way, as he descended into the cellar 
and faced the proprietor of the den, who held a halfpenny can- 
dle above his head to get a look at us both. 

The master of the mansion finally recognized my compan- 
ion, but did not seem at all well pleased with his visit. 

" Well," he said, in a very gruff voice, " is hit bizness or 
pleasure? Vich? Kase, hif hits bizness you must 'elp your- 
self." 

" Oh, pleasure by all means, Purty Bill," said the sergeant, 
" myself and friend here, who is a son of Henry Clay, as was 



" PURTY BILL.' 



61 



President of the United States of America, just wants to see 
how the fun is goin' on to-night, and as I knew you kept a 
fiist-class place, Bill, I thought I would bring him around to see 
you. He has called on the Queen, Mr. Bright, Mr. Gladstone, 
the Hemperor of the French, and he expressed a great desire 
to see ' Purty Bill ; ' so here we are." 

The hideous vagabond seemed touched by this piece of insid- 
ious flattery, and said in a modified tone : 




PURTY BILL SHOWING US IN, 



" Oh, well, that's fair enough. I don't hask hanything bet- 
|ter. But ye see I thought you might ha' wanted some of my 
lodgers, and so many of them have been done for lately that 
they are getting suspicious of my honesty, and I have to be 
careful. Come this way," and he held the halfpenny candle 
over his head, which gave me a chance to observe him. The 
jaan was about six feet two inches in height, and much in 
'orm of shoulders like an ox, with loins like a prize-fighter. 
rhe face was pitted terribly with small-pox, his entire face was 



62 HIDDEN DEPTHS. 

seared, and even the corners of his eyebrows seemed eaten 
away by the awful disease. Hence his name of " Purty Bill." 
His eyes were of a greenish blue, and his attire was that of a 
costermonger ; a smock of canvass, and knee breeches and 
huge shoes, whose heavy nails made rapid incisions in the clay 
floor of the long, dark passage through which we had to pass 
until we came to still another door. This door was not a 
door ; in fact it was only a few planks strongly nailed together, 
and was not more than four feet high, so that we were all com- 
pelled, as " Purty Bill " lifted the latch, to put our feet in first, 
and making half circles of our bodies, we entered, and after de- 
scending three or four flagged steps we were at last in the cel- 
lar and establishment proper over which " Purty Bill " claimed 
a proprietary interest. 

It was one of the strangest sights I ever saw — the interior 
of this AVild Beast's Den. It was a huge cellar formerly used 
as a brewery, of perhaps a hundred by seventy-five feet in di- 
mension. 

The ceiling, or, rather, the rough, unplaned beams which 
supported the roof above us, gave an appearance of great 
strength to the place. There was a large fireplace in the cen- 
ter of the cellar, around which fifty or sixty persons sat, of all 
ages and of both sexes. The floor was of damp clay, smooth 
and trodden by the feet of countless thieves, vagabonds, and 
prostitutes. The corners of the cellar were buried in dark- 
ness, while the center of the cavern, near the fireplace, was 
bright with the flames of a fire of logs, which threw a flicker- 
ing light on the wooden beams, the broken chairs and stools, 
the pewter pots in the hands of the lodgers, and on many faces 
stained with dirt and ploughed up with crime and misery. There 
were thirty or forty berths roughly constructed as they are in 
the emigrant steerage of a Liverpool packet, and a heap of 
dirty straw in each indicated that they were used as beds by 
the occupants of the apartments. There was a large black pot 
hanging from a big hook, which depended from the brick 
chimney, and from this pot came a steaming odor of soup, or 
stew of some kind. The majority of the lodgers were sitting 



.11 



"WONT YOU TAKE SOMETHING?" 



63 



on the bare ground, which was dry and hardened near the fire, 
while at a distance from its flame the ground was rather damp 
and the lodgers sat on broken stools or on ragged pieces of 
matting, broken pieces of willow ware, logs of wood, bundles 
of rags, or any other article, or articles, that were convertible 
into seats for the time being. 

The room was lighted by four or five candles, which were 
stuck in glass bottles, the bottles being fastened to the joists 
which supported the berths in which the lodgers slept. The 
people nearest the fire had fragments of food in their hands 
and were evidently preparing for a grand midnight feast. 
Some of them were 
peeling potatoes, and 
one old fellow with 
rheumy eyes had a 
piece of bacon of five 
or six pounds weight 
between his crossed 
knees on a board, 
which he was cutting 
into small square 
lumps, and as he 
hacked a piece off he 
threw it at random 
into the large pot. 
A young girl was en- 
gaged in carving a 
huge cabbage-head, 
and her assistant was 
scraping carrots and 
parsnips. Every one 
seemed interested about the pot, and every one seemed to have 
some contribution for the feast, which 1 found was a co-opera- 
tive one, 

"Purty Bill " bustled about and found two broken stools for 
myself and conductor, and placed them near the fire, saying 
in a hospitable way : 




"wont tou take something? 



64 HIDDEN DEPTHS. 

" Gent's, this ere night is weriy wet, and you might as well 
dry yourselves. Sit up nearer the fire. "Won't ye take some- 
think ? " and he put his huge paws on the detectives knee in a 
friendly way. " This is agoin to be a topper of a meal to- 
night, and all of us will welcome ye gents to our 'umblc board. . 
So make yerselves at 'ome, and peck a bit when it's biled." 

" Wot's the idea of getting up this cram at this time of the 
morning, Bill ? " It's near two o'clock. Won't it interfere 
with yer lodgers' precious digestion ? " 

" Hinterfere with it ? Wot, vith one of my lodgers ? Ray- 
ther ! No. Vy there's Kicking Billy as heats six blessed 
meals a day, and then he's all the time a lookin' for sangwich- 
es and pigs trotters a-tween meals. Urt their digestion hin- 
deed ? Vy they 'av got stomax like them ere hanimals wot 
performs at Hastlcys. You knows Slap-Up Peter. You used 
to be a stone swallower in the purfession," and the proprietor 
touched a man who was squatted on his haunclies, smoking a 
dirty stump of clay pipe, with his foot. Slap-Up Peter drew 
the pipe out of his mouth, shook the ashes from it, dusted the 
venerable relic with a greasy red handkerchief, carefully 
placed it in his breeches pocket, and said : 

" Vy don't ye keep yer big feet to yerself ? Wot hanimals 
do you mean ? Do you mean cammomiles ? " 

" Yes, them hanimals vith the 'umps on their hugly backs. 
You see, sir, Slai>Up Peter has had a good eddy cation in his 
time, and he knows the names of the hanimals, 'cos he used 
to travel with the circus afore he went on the tramp to swallow 
stones and snakes." 

"Peter," said the detective, "you must 'ave quite an 'istry. 
Could you tell us somethink about your past life, my boy ? " 

Slap-Up Peter had a melancholy face. The skin was tanned, 
the eyes large, black, and bulging, and the nose like a hawk's. 
His clothes were worn and greasy ; his face was gaunt, and 
when he moved his body the bones seemed to creak and grate 
as if they had been joined together by metallic hinges. There 
was something mournful about the man — some queer story at- 
tached to him, I felt. 



PETER AND JUDY. 65 

" Tell ye me 'istiy, is it ? Veil, I don't mind if I do ; but 
tliem as hears my story mout give me somethink to drink first, 
for I ham werry dry. I lost my woice speaking on the Histab- 
lished Church bill tother night in Parlymint, and I've been 
'oarse hever since." 

"Well, take a drop, Peter," said Kicking Billy, a one-eyed 
and one-legged, and rascally looking fellow, who sat with his 
crutches between his knees, toasting his shins at the fire, and 
he handed a bottle to Slai>Up Peter, who took it without say- 
ing a word, and lifting it to his mouth, took a deep, deep 
draught without winking. 

" Look at that fellow that they call Kicking Billy — the one- 
legged fellow, I mean," said the detective to me. " He's a 
returned burglar, that fellow, and has served fourteen years. 
This place is full of thieves. They are nearly all thieves, and 
this is a thieves feast," he whispered in my ear. 

" My name is Peter Wilson, and I've been in the shoAV busi- 
ness for sixteen years, come Christmas, man and boy. I'm 
thirty-eight years of age now, and they called mc Sla}>Up Pe- 
ter when I fust began jumpin', as a hacrobat in the penny 
gaffs. Cos wy, I had a way of turnin' myself over a chair and 
coming back-handed on a somerset that used to take well, but 
now so many does it that the haudience don't mind it a bit. I 
jumped for four years, and wos counted pretty good in my line 
until I dislocated my wrist a doin' of the Pyramids of Hegypt, 
and then I vos laid hup and couldn't jump for six months and 
hover ; so I thought I'd leave the bus'ness and happear in 
another character. I got married to — " 

" More fool you," said Kicking Billy, sententiously, taking a 
drink. 

" Well, hit didn't cost you nothing, no more than it did for 
the government to support you in Botany Bay for fourteen 
years. So you needn't hinterrupt me again." 

" Go lion, Peter, and never mind him, its only 'is chaff." 

" Well, as I wos saying," continued Slap-Up Peter, " I got 
married, and maybe it was rayther foolish, for when we were 
spliced, Judy and I — she wos an Irish gal and a good worker — 



66 HIDDEN DEPTHS. 

we went into our cash account and found that we had only one 
pun six shillings and height pence, not a blessed brown more. 
I said to Judy — she wor a good gal — 

" Judy, we can't keep 'ause on twenty-six sliillings capital, 
that's shure. That's all our fortune in silver and gold, and it 
won't last long. So wot will we do ? " 

" ' Well, Peter,' said she, ' I didn't marry you for the dirty 
money ; I married you cos' you were sich a good jumper and 
hacrobat, and I'll stick to you now when you can't jump any 
more ; ' for you see, Billy, my wrist was two years afore it got 
well." 

" ' Let us pad the hoof together,' said Judy, * and we'll do 
the best we can. Let us two work the southern counties and 
we'll get long French or Hitalyan names, and we'll pick up a 
shillin here and there.' Cos you see," said Peter, " Judy had 
been born and bred in Shoreditch, and she knew all the wan- 
dering play-actors and showmen, and she wor hup to all their 
affs. So I next came out as ' Signer Hokenfokos, the fiery sal- 
amander of Naples, and my wife, the Baroness Padila, who 
had to leave her country on account of the wiolent love 
vich the king's son would persist in making hup to her, 
and she had to leave all her property, to the amount of 
six millions, behind her.' This was a good lay and we 
made from three to eight shillings a day down in Devonshire 
and Cornwall, wherever we could get a crowd together. I 
used to swaller hot iron bars, pokers, and red hot coals, and 
my wife used to play the hurdy-gurdy while I was swallerin' 
the hot coals. I improved at this werry much in two years, 
and then, after I had vorked the hot coals out, Judy said to 
me one day : 

" ' Peter, why don't you try and swaller snakes and swords ? 
They are better than coals, and not so dangerous.'" 

" ' Yes, but I don't know how,' I said, ' and I don't like 
snakes at all, they are so precious slimy.' You see sir, even then 
I didn' know what it was to get used to a thing. Well, I com- 
menced to swallow knives at first, and I liad to oil them — 
that's the trick you see — with sweet oil as good as I could find 



SNAKE SWALLOWING. 



67 



at eighteen pence a pint, and I had to rub this on with a piece 
of shammy cloth. This oil lets the knife down easily, and 
when I wos well drilled there wos no danger at all — only I had 
to be sober. My swallow was hawful bad with the hirritation 
for two months, but I got over that ; for when I felt my throat 
sore I took sugar and lemon juice, and gorgled my throat and 
that took the soreness away." 

" Tell us about the snakes, Peter," said Purty Bill. " That's 
a good story, sir," to the author. 




#"^^4-- ®*.^'2&^e?'^ftl.v^ 



SNAKE SWALLOWING STORY. 

"Ah ! that was the most unlikely thing I hever took to. It 
went aginst my stomach hawful to swaller the snakes at first, 
and I don't believe I'd ever have done it if it hadn't been for 
Judy, who said to me, wlien I kicked agin it, — 

" ' Wot difference does it make, Peter, whether you swallow 
red hot coals or snakes ? The snakes has their stings all taken 
out, and its nothing more than swallowin' a sausage or pork 
saveloy.' " 

5 



68 HIDDEN DEPTHS. 

" Well, I -went at it with a very bad 'art, and my old •vroman 
used to play ' Boncy's Iklarch Across the Halps,' and the 
' Death of Nelson,' whenever I swallowed a snake. You see 
I generally took a snake aljout fourteen or fifteen inches, or 
maybe a foot and a half long. The sting is out, you know, 
and I takes the head and puts the snake in, and if he doesn't 
go down why I pinches his tail, and then he rolls down the 
throat. It made me sea-sick at first, and the people in Sussex 
thought I was the devil out and out, and a good many hexam- 
ined my feet, which were in tights, to see if I had cloven feet. 
A goodish lot of people thinks that the snake goes entirely 
down the throat, but it stands to reason that the snake is more 
frightened than the man, and he does not go down, and hif he 
did he would be glad to come up, I can tell you." 

" Don't you put somethink in your throat," said a boy of 
fourteen, who was known among the confraternity as ' Teddy 
the Kinchin ; ' " I mean, to make the snake sick if he'd go 
too far." 

" No, that's no use at all ; you see he doesn't go hall the 
way down. He is afraid, is the snake, and if you cough he'll 
come up and draw himself up and coil in a bunch in your 
mouth. But the duffers who pay their money think that the 
snake is in your stomach. It stands to reason that he'd get 
sick. It makes a man retch, and the first snake I swallowed I 
threw up and had awful vomits, but the next one I rather rel- 
ished it, and it did me a sight o' good, like an oyster does after 
ye 'ave been drinkin at night and take's tuppence worth of 
natives in the morning. Well, when I began snake-swallow- 
ing it was rather new, and I had it all my own way for a long 
time, but finally, lots of men began to swallow snakes, and coal 
swallowing was not as good as it usfcd to be ; so I took to bal- 
lad singing, Judy and I. By this time we had sixty pounds . 
saved, and we Avere doing well, but I made the acquaintance 
of a lot of Doncaster men, who knew I had the money, and 
before I could say ' Jack Robinson,' the money was all gone. 
Judy was in her confinement then, and she took on so bad 
about it that she died in child-bed, and the kid as well, and 



slap-up-peter's song. 69 

I've been on the tramp ever since, and now I do an odd turn 
at anything that turns up, but mostly I sing ballads, and make 
sometimes a shilling a day, and sometimes eightpence and 
ninepence a day. Times have changed for me. Worse luck." 

Here the snake-swallower's story ended. 

" Slap-Up Peter, will you give us a song ? and I'll give you 
a drink, me oul wiper," said the crippled Kicking Billy to the 
snake-swallower. 

" Well, Billy, I don't mind if I do," said Slap-Up Peter, 
draining the tin skillet to the last greasy drop. 

The thieves, loafers, and women gathered around the fire in 
a half circle, and Purty Bill heaped logs very liberally, while 
Slap-Up Peter chanted in a hoarse voice the song, an extract 
of which I give below, as near as I remember it with my rec- 
ollections of the scene, the choking smoke, the blazing fire, 
and the band of outcasts and outlaws in the den in White- 
chapel : 

'Twas down in Whitechapel that once I used to dwell, 

And of all the coves that knocked about, I was the greatest swell, 

My highlows were the cheese, with breeches to the knees. 

Oh, my toggery was quite correct — my coat was Irish frieze. 

My togs from Bond street came, it's a nobby slap-up street, 

In a fashionable locality — the swells the girls there meet ; 

Nicol's my man for shirts, with his I cut a shine, 

His shop's in far famed Regent street, he's a pal-o'-mine. 

Rum too-rul-um, Happy-go-Bill, 
Inyuns and greens who'll buy. 

Rum too-rul-um, Happy-go-Bill, 
Inyuns and greens who'll buy. 

" That's a fine melojous voice of yours," said Purty Bill to 
the singer. 

'• He's used to it," said one of the women. 

Here's Spuds at Thrums a pound, they're prime 'uns as I've found, 

Oh, I've Reds and Dukes and Flukes and Blues, I sells in going my round. 

My greens are superfine, full blown and hearty are mine. 

Oh, come make a deal with me, my dear ; don't wait, you'll find 'em prime. 

My inyuns now are new, you'll find what I says is true. 

In fact, the Queen, since these she's seen has cartloads just a few ; 



TO HIDDEN DEPTHS. 

My carrots are long and red, you'll find theyVe well bred, 
My vegetables are the cheese, bunch for you — i^enny-a-head. 
Rum too-rul-um, '&c. 

" Now give US the last werse with all the 'armony," said 
Teddy the Kinchin, in a piping voice. 

" I vill, vith moosh plesh-yar, as the Frenchman said," re- 
turned Slap-Up Peter. 

Jerry, my moke's a bird, of him perhaps you've heard, 
He knows his way about, he does, to match him's quite absurd ; 
Just see him cock his eye when grrub time's gettin"- nif^h. 
He likes his feed, he does indeed, he lives on cabbage-pie. 
Now any girl that's kind, and a husband wants to find, 
I'm ready made and so's my trade, that's if I'm to her mind ; 
So down to Whitechapel we'll trudge again to dwell. 
And of all the coves that knock about I'll be the greatest swell. 
Rum too-rul-um, &c. 

" That's wot I call a topper of a song. It's so werry senti- 
mental that it makes a gal peep. The lines are werry touch- 
in'," said a young gal of sixteen or seventeen years of age, who 
was not badly dressed nor bad-looking, and who went by the 
name of " Bilking Bet." She was a favorite, and several of 
them called upon her to sing. She had just the same mock 
modesty, this young woman with the brassy face, as if she had 
been a fashionable lady at the West End, with a jointure and 
a coach and six. 

" Wot's that young gal's name. Bill," said the detective to 
the boss of the thieves. 

He did not seem inclined to tell at first, but said sullenly, 
"you don't want her do you ? No ? Well then that's " Bilk- 
ing Bet,' she used to be a 'coster gal but now she's on the 
cross." 

" Oho ! " said Serjeant Moss, " that's the gal as was hup be- 
fore Mr. Knox at Marlboro street the other morning for snatch- 
ing a lady's purse in a push." 

" Yes," said Purty Bill, " but there was no proof aginst the 
gal. She was brought out has hinnocent as the new-born 
baby. She wor." 



THE COSTER GAL. 71 

" Of course, Bill, you had that done and cooked. One of 
those nice little halybi's as you halways 'ave ready just to suit 
your customers. ' Bilking Bet ' was down in Wales a waitin 
upon her poor sick mother, who was down with the scarlet 
fever, and not expected to live. My Heye ? Eh, Bill, one 
of your old tricks ? But, I say. Bill, don't you get ketched, 
cos its over the water to Charly with ye hif I ketch ye." 

This conversation was carried on in the corner of the room, 
from which we could see that the group around the fire were 
preparing to hear a song from " Bilking Bet," who cleared 
her throat twice with a pull at a gin bottle — no glasses here to 
annoy a person — and l)egan, in a mellow and not unpleasing 
voice, the following slang song which is common among the 
London costermongers, but is seldom heard among the thieves. 
The song, no doubt, she owed to her early costermonger asso- 
ciations, before she became a pickpocket. She was now one 
of the most expert in London, and was the kept mistress of a 
well known burglar, who had, two days before I saw her, bro- 
ken open a tea shop in the Old Bailey, near Ludgate Hill. 

The song was as follows : 

" THE coster' gal." 

Some chaps they talk of damsels fine, 

Being angels bright and fair, 
But they should only see my girl, 

She is beyond compare, 
She is the finest girl that's out, 

Her name is Dinah Denny, 
When you are out you'll hear her shout 

" New Walnuts, twelve a penny ! " 

Chorus. — S'holp me never none so clever, 
As my Dinah Denny, 
Can shout about, all round about 
" New AValnuts, twelve a penny." 

Her voice is like a dove. 

And bright is her black eye, 
I think she does me truly love, 

She looks at me so sly. 



72 



HIDDEN DEPTHS. 

She sports the smartest side spring boots, 

Eclipse her cannot many, 
And shows feet small, while she does call 

" New Walnuts, twelve a penny." 
Chorus, &c. 

Rich noblemen may dress their wives 

In silk or satin dress. 
But Dinah I like quite as well 

In her Manchester print, " Express," 
We're going to be wed, and then 

If offspring we have many. 
We'll be nuts on, and christen them 

" New Walnuts, twelve, a penny." 
Chorus, &c. 




BILKING BET TAKES THE CHAIR 



'• Now I think that's werry neat and happropriate to the hoc- 
casion," said a cockney lodger who had successfully begged 
twopence from the detective to pay for his lodging, which he 
handed over to " Purty Bill " as soon as he got the pennies. 



" TEDDY THE KINCHEN's SONG." 73 

" I moves we put Bilking Bet in the cheer ? Wot dye say, 
gentlemen and ladies hall, to the proposition ? " 

" Hall right. Bet take the cheer and give us some of yer 
'Ouse of Commons." 

" Bilking Bet " was escorted to the middle of the group, 
placed standing on a three-legged stool without any visible back, 
and assuming as stately an air as she was capable of, the 
young girl, with the most perfect sang froid, began : 

" Me lords and gentlemen, and likewise the ladies. Me no- 
ble pickpockets, gonofifs, blokes, and pinchers. I am with you 
this hevening, for what purpose, I hask ? For avot purpose i 
HASK ? Why, to be present at the feast which takes place 
hannerally among the members of our noble purfession — shall 
I say dignified purfession ? No ; I won't." 

" But ye have said it. Bet," said Kicking Billy. 

" Hear ! hear ! Shut up, will ye, and let the gal tork," said 
Slai>Up Peter. 

" Well," said Bet, broken down in her attempt at a speech, 
" I move that we have a songfrom' Teddy the Kinchin.' Will 
he hoblige ? " 

" He will ! he will ! " said a dozen voices. 

" I am sorry, me blokes, that my woice is so werry much 
out of tune in singing at Her Majesty's Hopera in the Hay- 
market, but howsumbever, as I have given hup my hengage- 
ment at that 'ouse, I'll fake you a few werses to show wot I 
woncc wos wlien I wos in woice," said this cheerful young 
blackguard and thief, who had a pair of eyes like a ferret, and 
could not have been more than seventeen years of age, as he 
stood there dressed in the height of his idea of the fashion, 
with a flashy velvet coat and satin scarf, showing a huge pin. 
He sang, after clearing his throat with a long drink of gin, as 
follows : 

" TEDDY THE KIXCHIN's SONG." 
I am a curious comical cove 
Everybody does own O, 

Hey ricketty Barlow, Cock-a-doodle-do I 



74 



HIDDEN DEPTHS. 



I was born one day when father was out, 
And mother she wasn't at home O, 

Hey ricketty Barlow, &c. 
I went to school and played the fool, 
At learning was a shy man. 

Hey ricketty Barlow, &c. 
The boys they used to hollo out, 
♦' There goes a Simple Simon ! " 

Hey ricketty Barlow, &c. 
Oh lor ! oh my ! I'm a Simple Simon, 
Oh lor ! oh my ! cock-a-doodle-do ! 
"Where ere I go the folks they know. 
And call me " Simple Simon ; " 

Hey ricketty Barlow, &c. 

Haltogether, please," said the Kinchin. 

I used to " kick " the cobbler out, 
And rip up people's pockets, 

Hey ricketty Barlow, &c. 
And I was very fond of throwing stones 




TEDDY THE KINOHIN's SONG. 



TEDDY THE KINCHIN. 75 

And lumps of mud at coppers, 

Iley ritketty Barlow, &c. 
But now I'm going to settle down, 
Won't I cut a shine O, 

Hey ricketty Barlow, &c. 
I'll many a gal with lots of Tin, 
And won't I spend her rhino, 

Hey ricketty Barlow, &c. 
Oh lor ! oh my ! &c. 

" Now, once more, and a good haltogether please," and 
the young pickpocket sat down amid thunders of applause from 
every one in the cellar belonging to the band of thieves. 

The thieves stew was now declared ready for consumption 
by the chef de cuisine, and as I at least felt no appetite for 
such a rich dish, we left this underground den of infamy just 
as a few faint streaks of the coming dawn began to gild the 
spire of St. Boldolph's ancient church. 

" That Purty Bill is one of the greatest scoundrels in Lon- 
don. He is a fence, and we've got him once or twice, but he 
minds himself now, and we are after his tricks every day. 
His cellar used to be a brewery, that's why he's got so much 
room underground, and his game is to let out lodgings, at two 
pence a night, for a blind, and then they can stay all day at 
this place until twelve o'clock at night, and if they cannot pay 
sure for the next niglit's lodging in advance, unless they are 
in very good circumstances, he clubs them out, and they have 
got to pad the hoof until daybreak, and sleep where they can. 
Good night." And we parted for that twenty-four hours. 





CHAPTER yi. 

DEBATING CLUBS AND COGERS'S HALL. ' 

HOE lane hath a veiy uiiromantic sound for a 
locality. It does not smell of the aristoc- 
racy. It hath not even a slight favor of the 
Landed Gentry, and no one could possibly 
take the trouble to find armorial bearings or 
liatchments for Shoe lane. Yet is Shoe lane 
a most eloquent place, and there is a little old public house 
there deemed second only in point of fame by the admirers of 
forensic eloquence who frequent it, to the House of Commons. 
The way was long and dreary that Saturday night that I 
strolled from Long Acre, whose carriage-shops and leather 
manufacturers' stalls were all closed for the day ; and the sul- 
try London fog came down, blinding the pedestrians, as I 
turned from Lincoln' s-Inn-fields into the better-lighted High 
Holborn, with the glare from its brassy gin-shops and dirty- 
looking old houses, that seemed all of them as if a good scour- 
ing would have done them an incalculable service in the way 
of a fresher appearance. I thought that Shoe lane was in a 
very suspicious neighborhood. 

Turning to the left through Farringdon Market, a huge 
square seemingly devoted to the worship of highly odorous 
vegetables, I came into the narrow Shoe lane, which runs 
down at its bottom to Fleet street, just below where the gray 
stone arch of Temple bar bisects the Strand and Fleet street. 
There is nothing particularly noticeable about this part of Shoe 
lane. 

There is a ham and beef shop, with its layers of cold meat- 



SHOE LANE. 77 

pies piled on top of each other in the windows ; and across 
the way there is the inevitable gin-shop, with its polished brass 
fender outside to keep off the boys who have no money to 
spend in gin, and there arc the enticing signs all over the gin- 
shop telling of the merits of the brown-stout there A'cnded, 
and the Burton ale and somebody's " entire " malt liquors 
which tlie proprietor assures the public are only genuine at his 
shop. 

The lane is narrow here and not more than three or four 
men could pass abreast, although there are sidewalks to the 
lane, or rather apologies for sidewalks. This narrow lane is 
one of the few remaining relics of old London. Below, at the 
foot of Shoe lane, runs Fleet street — one of the busiest marts 
in the world, which is ever jammed and blocked with drays, 
cabs, and vehicles of all descriptions crowding to and fro, in 
sight of the mighty dome of St. Paul's ; and under the pave- 
ment of that street, so famous for its publications and shops, 
the old River Fleet once ran in a dirty, hideous current, until 
it emptied its garnered filth into the Thames. 

Here, opposite Shoe lane, one of the curious old conduits 
that formerly supplied old London with water might have been 
seen about the time of the wars of the Roses, when the Eng- 
lish nobles were hard at work cutting each other's throats- and 
making and unmaking kings for the want of something better 
to do. The cistern erected at the point where Shoe lane inter- 
j sects Fleet street, was counted one of the handsomest in 
I London. Stow — that quaint, old, musty chronicler — says : 
j " Upon it was a fair tower of stone, garnished with the im- 
Jage of St. Christopher on the top, and angels lower down, 
I found about, with sweetly sounding bells before them, whcrc- 
jupon, by an engine placed in the tower, they, divers hours of 
[the day and night, with hammers chimed such a hymn as was 
jappointed." Frolicsome Anne Boleyn, the first day that she 
' ivas queened, rode through Shoe lane on her way to the sacred 
^bbey of Westminster to receive the gilded toy upon her fair 
"orehead, and pageantry and pomp met her at every step of 
ler palfrey, in Cornhill, Cheapside, Fleet street, and Shoe lane. 



78 DEBATING CLUBS AND COGERS HALL. 

In those days the streets and lanes of London were narrow 
and difficult, and the unfortunate queen that was to be might 
have touched the over-hanging eaves and gables of the houses in 
her progress tlirough tlie city without leaving her saddle. The 
conduit in Slioc lane Avas grandly gilded over to do her honor, 
and ran wine for the whole day. At the base of the conduit 
a starvling poet sat reciting verses in her honor as she and her 
newly made ruffian of a husband passed, and no doubt this 
mediaeval Mormon was highly pleased with the conceit. 
There were towers and turrets erected to do her honor in Shoe 
lane, and in one of these towers, according to the chronicler, 
" was such several solemn instruments that seemed to be an 
heavenly noise, and was much regarded and praised ; and, be- 
sides this, the conduit ran wine, claret and white, all the after- 
noon ; so she, with all her company, rode forth to Temple Bar, 
which was newly painted and repaired, where stood also divers 
singing men and children, till she came to Westminster Hall, 
which was richly hanged with cloths of Arras." 

"While Prince Hal was splitting the sculls of fractious 
Frenchmen at Agincourt and fording the passage of the Som- 
me. Sir Rol)ert Ferras de Chastley held eight cottages in Shoe 
lane from his Icing. Here and there was a garden peeping 
forth in its floral verdure ; and here was also the town residence 
of the Bishops of Bangor, powerful and pious prelates in their 
day, God wot and odds bodkins ; and as early as 1378 they held 
the tenure by virtue of the patent of the forty-eighth of Ed- 
ward the Tliird, which says in most barbarous Latin : " Ununi 
messuag ; unam placeam terrce, vnam gardinum cum aliis 
cedificis in Shoe Lane, London.''^ 

Times have changed since then in Shoe lane. A bishop of 
Bangor now, with his train of lances, his men-at-arms, mitre, 
cross-bearer, and torches, woidd be a sight indeed in Shoe 
lane. How that l)right-eycd bar-maid at the door of the Blue 
Pig would stare at his lordship ! How the greasy boy in the 
ham and beef shop would shout at the cope and silks and vel- 
vet housings — taking them, pcrhajjs, in an innocent way, for a 
part of the Lord Mayor's show ! And as for the conduit run- 



SOCIETY OF COGERS. 79 

ning Claret and Malmsley, the beer-swilling cockneys would 
not thank headless Anne Boleyn for such washy foreign 
stuff. Their fancy could only be fed by gin. A man-at-arms 
would be compelled nowadays to wash his throat with Bass's 
bitter beer or brown stout, instead of sack, hippocras, or mead. 

At last we arc in the neighborhood of " Cogers Hall " — the 
hall of the Ancient and Honorable Society of Cogers. There 
is a gin-shop at the front, with its low doorway and flaring 
signs. The windows are well lit, and by the side of the bar is 
a long, narrow passage conducting the visitor for twenty or 
thirty feet to a back room, about forty feet long and twenty- 
five feet wide. 

Off the passage are a number of small waiting-rooms, noisy 
and smoky, with the voices and vile pipes of the occupants. 
Four rows of tables run along the room, in which are present 
fifty or sixty persons all of the male sex. They are all decent- 
ly dressed, for, although the admission is free, yet is tli^ visitor 
to the Cogers Hall expected to drink or eat something, and 
the place, with its tariff of prices, though moderate enough to 
an American, would not suit a costcrmonger or laborer. 

The roof is arched and paneled, done in a feeble imitation 
of the style of Sir Christopher Wren, who is popularly sup- 
posed to have built everything in London after the great fire of 
1666. A handsome chandelier depends from an opening in the 
roof, and is ornamented with a number of glass globes, which 
serve to light the apartment and dissipate the thick clouds of 
smoke that constantly arise in the room. 

There is a large, gaudy sign in the hall, on which are prin- 
ted these cabalistic words : " Hot joints are served in this 
room from one until five." At the farther end of the room, 
opposite the entrance, is a paneling hollowed back in the 
wall, the entire room being paneled ; and this paneling is 
shaped like a door, and is gilded. A step from the floor, in 
the paneling, is placed a chair of honor, which is occupied by 
the Most Worthy Grand, as he is styled ; or, in fact, the chair- 
man of the meeting. Those who are familiar with him go so 
far in their irreverence as to call this awful personage " Me 



80 DEBATING CLUBS AND COGERS HALL. 

Grand," and whispers have been lieard that his name in real- 
ity is Tompkins or Noakes. 

Directly opposite this dignitary, at the other end of the 
room, is a place in the paneling and a chair like to that which 
I have already described, and this is occupied by a tall, lean 
man, with side whiskers of a grayish pattern, who has the title 
of Vice Grand. 

But the Vice, or Worthy Wicc, is of greatly inferior dignity 
to the Most Worthy Grand. He is, so to speak, an empty or- 
nament of the feast, and his duties are simple, and confined to 
calling out in unison with the assemblage, " Hear, hear," or 
" Good." " You arc Right," when the Worthy Grand, in his or- 
acular sentences, is most happy. At other times, in a loud voice 
he will call the attention of the waiters, who heartily detest 
him for his interference, to the fact that some customer has 
drained his beer, or gin and hot water, and needs, therefore, 
to be served afresh. 

Still this man is human, and will listen, when off his seat 
of duty, to any scandal against the Most Worthy Grand with 
secret pleasure. In fact, the Worthy Wice, inspired by a gen- 
erous fourpence worth of gin and hot water, told me aside, in 
conversation, that the Worthy Grand was unfit for his high 
position. " He his han hass, sir. He his too Hold. And he 
'as no woice watsomever, sir. Bah ! that, sir, for Tompkins" 
— and the Worthy Wice snapped his fingers in an insane man- 
ner at the air in which his potent imagination had conjured up 
the semblance of the Worthy Grand. Sitting down at a table 
I followed the custom of the place and called for something. 
On each table were placed a couple of long-shanked clay pipes, 
and a thin-necked, big-paunched, red-clay jar, which a man 
sitting near explained to my satisfaction. 

" You see," said, he in a rather mysterious voice, " we 
'aven't much ice to speak of in England ; leastways, it is too 
dear, and this 'ere red clay 'as a peculiar ^virtue — it keeps the 
water as cold as if it was in the waults of Bow Church." 

This man was decently dressed, and was, I believe, a drover 
by profession. He was very fleshy and very red in the face. 



AT THE TABLES. 81 

Tissues of fat lay around his eyebrows in layers, and his double 
chin was dewlapped like one of his own beeves. He had a 
heavy red hand, and was, as I found out, a true Briton in every 
sense. I asked him why the place was called Cogers Hall. To 
this conundrum he confessed himself unable to answer, but 
after scratching his head the " Beefy One," as I shall call him, 
made a sign for a waiter to come to the table. " I say," said 
the Beefy One, " why do you call this place Cogers 'All ? " 
The waiter could not satisfy him, but said that he would call 
the Master. Well, the Master came, a thin-faced, side-whis- 
kered Englishman, with watery blue eyes and trembling lip. 
The counterfeit presentment of the Master hung over the Wor- 
thy Grand's chair of state, done in oil, and it seemed as if the 
artist had endeavored, in accordance with the spirit of tlie 
Cogers Hall, to give the face an oratorical, Gladstonian ex- 
pression, and the cloak was folded around the shoulders of tlie 
Master as the toga is folded around the shoulders of Tully, 
in classic pictures. Besides the picture of the Master, several 
other pictures of Past Worthy Grands were hung as tokens of 
their former forensic abilities. The Master, in answer to the 
question why the place was called Cogers Hall, said : 

" Well, you see, we calls it Cogers Hall from the Latin ko- 
gee-TO — to cogitate, to think. Oh, yes, sir, we have been a 
long time established, sir ; since 1756, sir ; a matter of a 
hundred years or so, sir. You are han Hamerican, sir. Oh, 
yes, sir, we've 'ad George Francis Train' 'ere, sir, for many a 
night, sir ; and 'e spoke in that chair, sir ; and when he was 
arrested, sir, in Ireland, tlie Home Secretary as wos, sir, wrote 
to mo to question me if he had spoken treason, sir, or spoke 
agin the Queen, sir. Cos ye see, sir, the principle of an Eng- 
lishman, sir, is to allow every man liberty to say wot he likes, 
sir, so long as he does not speak agin the Queen or speaks 
treason. That's an Englishman's principle, sir." 

And George Francis Train had spoken in this very room ! I 
could fancy the feelings of poor Artemus Ward when he stood 
at the the tomb of Shakespeare at Stratford. These wooden 
chairs and benches were hallowed in my eyes henceforward. 



82 DEBATING CLUBS AND COGERS HALL. 

Men had sat upon those chairs who had listened to the fervid 
eloquence of a Train, and perhaps some of these very men 
had survived. Civis Americanus sum. 

As the night came on apace, the smoky, oldfashioned, pan- 
eled room began to fill up, and before long nothing could be 
seen but rows of men lining the small tables, puffing vigor- 
ously iVom the long clay pipes, and at intervals taking deep 
draughts from the large, brightly burnished metal pots, hold- 
ing a pint each, or perhaps sipping fourpenny glasses of hot 
gin and water. Along with the little jar of hot water which 
tlic waiter brought on demand, were little saucers of sugar — 
these little saucers never containing, by any chance, more than 
three lumps of sugar, and each of these lumps being equalized 
in size with a mathematical nicety. Some of the visitors, 
more hungry than others, satisfied their longings with " Welsh 
Rabbits," at sixpence apiece ; or, when the rabbits had, in addi- 
tion, two eggs cooked with them, the Welsh rabbit was called 
a "Golden Buck," and the waiter, in his greasy tail coat, 
raised his demand to eightpence. 

In a few minutes the Worthy Vice, a gray-bearded man with 
a meek face and in shabby-genteel clothes, took his seat, and 
all the chairs in the apartment were turned around by those 
who occupied them in order that they might hear and see bet- 
ter. The Worthy Vice, who is sometimes entered on the bills 
of the performance as a " Patriot" when he has to take part 
in a discussion, read the minutes of the last meeting of the 
xVncient and Honorable Society of Cogers, which were listened 
to quietly, and then the attention of the audience was turned to 
the Most Worthy Grand, who occupied the chair at the other 
end of the apartment. This most noble Briton, in a quavering 
voice, having adjusted his vest — which had a tendency to leave 
exposed the lower part of the shirt-bosom at his stomach 
where his trousers bisected — opened the proceedings with 
much solemnity, imitating by hems and haws, as well as he 
could, tlic manners of the dullest and most commonplace ora- 
tors of the House of Commons. His business as a specialty 
Avas to review the events of the week. 



NEWS OF THE WEEK. 83 

" I don't think, gentlemen," said he, " that my task will be 
a very long one this hcvening in reviewing the hevents of the 
week. There, aw, 'asn't been much a-doing in furrin parts, 
ah, this week. There 'as been 'a row in Turkee again, and in, 
ah, fact we might say there is halways a row in Turkee, more 
or less. There's a man in Hegipt whom we call the Viceroy 
of that, ah, country, and when he, ah, wos here we gave 'im 
fireworks and sich, and made a blessed time about him, as we 
might say vulgarly, so to speak. Now, he has been a invi- 
tin' of all the sovrins of Europe on his own hook to see him 
and his ryal family open the Sooz Canal. Well, he has been, 
ah, spendin' sich a lot of money that the Sultan comes out in 
a long letter and calls him a Cadivar, which is a word that I 
can't understand, being neither Latin nor yet Greek. 

" Blessed hif I knowed that ye iver understood Greek or 
Lating, ither, Jimmy," said an old man who sat observant of 
the reviewer in a corner, drinking beer from a pewter pot. 

" I thank ye all the same, Mr. Wilkins, but I don't like to be 
interrupted when I'm speaking," answered the Most Worthy 
Grand. 

" You're right, Me Grand. Horder ! border ! " shouted sev- 
eral indignant voices. 

" I wos goin' to say," continued the Grand, after taking a 
deep draught of the porter which foamed in the pewter pot on 
the table before him — " I wos goin' to say that the state of 
our neighbor, Fronse, just hover the water, is now a spektikle 
for mankind. There's a great hadoo about the Hemperor's 
'elth ; and I must say as how he is in a bad way by all 
accounts. Nobody knows wot his disease is. It may be liver ; 
it may be kidneys. I might take the liberty of sayin', as a 
rule, kidneys is bad. No one knows wot would be the conse- 
quences if the Hemperor was to step out, wulgularly speakin'. 
It would p'r'aps be the cause of a general war in Europe. 
Hengland doesn't want any more wars. We 'ave 'ad enough 
of them. They does no good for the workin' man. (' Hear ! 
hear ! ') We pays the piper when the dancin' is done ; but 
we never dances ourselves." 
6 



84 DEBATING CLUBS AND COGERS HALL. 

" True as the gospel, Jimmy," from a beer drinker. 

" Now, there's another question which we all 'ave heard of 
a good deal, and that's the Ilalaljama claims. They are in a 
precious muddle, to be sure. They may be riglit and they 
may be wrong. But I must say that I don't see where the 
money is to come from to pay them." 

" We'll never pay them. We aint got the " dibs ; " least- 
ways, I won't pay any of it," says an irreverent young man 
whose face was quite flushed with strong drink. 

" Well, as far as that goes, if they are to be paid, we know 
it Avill come from the pockets of just such people as ourselves 
in the way of taxes. Its taxes halways." 

" I diifcr from the gentleman who preceded me altogether. 
Prussia must 'ave the left bank of the Rhine, and I'll put six- 
teen bullets in the Pope's heart. I tell ye, gentlemen, the 
Ekumenikal Council will be the downfall of the Romish reli- 
gion. I'll put sixteen bullets in the Pope's heart," cried out a 
tall, thin-faced man in a half-clerical suit of black, who got on 
his feet, and while in the act of energetically expressing his 
feeling, by a wave of his right hand carried away a glass 
globe shading the gaslight above his head. The man was very 
drunk appafently, but by his language seemed to be a person 
of education. The " Beefy One," who sat by my side, and 
who had reached his third bottle of beer, whispered to me : 

" I say, yon is a fine fellow when he's sober, and can talk 
poetry l)y the yard, l)ut he is very drunk, and when he's fud- 
dled he will talk a man blind about the Pope. Will you have 
some beer ? Do take a pot." 

It was with some trouble that the fiery Scotch orator was in- 
duced to sit down and defer his assault upon the Pope until a 
more fitting occasion. 

At this moment tlie Beefy One pointed out to me a tall, mar- 
tial-looking person in black clothes, who seemed to be very 
restive and looked as if he wanted to speak. He was of large 
frame, about sixty years of age, and was apparently a man of 
consi(]cral)le stamina and l)ackl)one. His white whiskers and 
neat dress gave him the look of a justice of the peace who had 



LIBERALS AND CONSERVATIYES. 



85 



dropped in to take a look at the assemblage from curiosity, 
and to see that the public morals and the constitution were 
properly taken care of. 

While the Worthy Grand was making a series of remarks 
on the health of the Emperor Napoleon and the menacing atti- 
tude of Prussia towards France in a gentle, slipshod way, the 
stranger looked up at times from the four-penn'orth of gin 
which he ordered when he came in to give an incredulous, 




COGEH8 HALL. 



doubting smile to a few of the coterie who sat around him and 
were evident admirers of his. The Beefy One whispered to 
me — 

" That ole gentlemun is the finest orator as ever was. I tell 
ye, sir, he can talk when he's agoing. There's no end to his 
beautiful sentiments, I do say it, although he's a Hirishman. 
Oh, 'e is a great horator is the Ole One." 

After the review of the week's public events by the Worthy 
Grand, debate was in order on the topics reviewed by him. I 



80 DEBATING CLUBS AND COGERS HALL. 

fouml that the debaters who jumped to tlieir feet one after the 
other ill a manner wortliy of the most dignified legislative as- 
semblage, were divided into two parties, liberals and conserv- 
tives. The Lil)erals were the most logical, strange to say ; the 
Tories were most dogmatic and violent. The Liberals — one of 
them at least — wished to do away with all monarchies and 
established churches; while the Conservatives, jmncipally be- 
longing to the shopkecping element, in the audience, were 
strenuously opposed to the eight-hour law and to the trades- 
unions. One liberal orator would liked to have seen, as he 
expressed it, all the kings, barons, prime ministers, and other 
like des})ots, placed in one old rotten hulk of a vessel, and then 
the vessel was to be scuttled on the Goodwin Sands. " And 
who," said the eloquent orator, " would not say that it would 
not be a benefit to the human race ? Who would not exclaim 
■with me," and here he looked around on his eager audience in 
a threatening manner, " the more of sich cattle in the rotten 
old ludk the Ijctter ? " There was a general grunt of acquies- 
cence from the advanced Liberals at this possibility and a dei> 
recatory shake of the head from one Conservative with a great 
clay pipe. 

Finally, the Irish orator got a chance, and then it was wonder- 
ful to sec how, in a sarcastic tone, he humbugged his hearers for 
half an hour by allusions to the good time coming, when every 
man should have a vote, and every Irish tenant should give up 
the graceful and sportsmanlike habit of potting from behind 
the Tipperary hedges all landlords who were in the way of a 
freeh(jld system. The orator waxed wroth and became pathetic 
at times as he reviewed the past glories of the Isle of Saints 
and her present degraded position among nations. Yet in that 
he was skilful enough, in speaking of the Fenians, to deprecate 
their acts mildly, but, at the same time, he told his English 
audience, in the most forcilde tones, of the abuses and tyranny 
that had led to the organization of Fenianism. 

" Oh, I say, 0'I)ricn,you are a humbugging of lius with that 
here gammon habout '98, ye know." 

" 1 give yes me word, me Worthy Grand and gentlemen, 



THE SCOTCH PRESBYTER[AN. 87 

tliat I do not advocate Fenianism at all, at all ; but when yes 
dln-ive min to madness by oppression, by acts of oppression 
such as the world has never seen, can yes blame the wu-r-rum 
if it turns on yes and bites." 

No one could reply to this with the exception of the Scotch 
Presbyterian, who, again rising from his seat, denounced the 
Pope and Dr. Gumming as accomplices, and declared that at 
the first opportunity he would cheerfully encounter martyrdom 
to be able to " put sixteen bullets into the Pope's carcass," as 
he politely and charitably expressed himself. " I didn't care 
about your Ekumenikul Council," said he ; " it will be the 
downfall of popishncss and prelacy, and those who may go 
there are welcome ; but as for me I would be burned to have 
him under my pistol." 

" Oh, Mac, yer not so bad as yer purtend in yer talk. I'll en- 
gage, if his Holiness would give ye the chance, ye'd only be 
too glad to kiss his toe." 

This raised a laugh at the Scotchman's expense, but he vio- 
lently disclaimed for himself, as a true disciple of John Knox, 
any intention of submitting to such a degrading act of spirit- 
ual submission. The debate continued as the night waned, and 
at eleven o'clock, when I left the hall of discussion in Shoe 
lane, the subjects of vaccination, land laws, and coinage were 
yet to be touched upon by the speakers. 

I have given but a glance at this place, which is the oldest 
established of its kind among a number of discussion halls 
and forums, whose sign-boards meet the stranger's eye in dif- 
ferent parts of the city where most thickly populated. There 
is invariably a pothouse attached to these debating places, or 
rather the debating halls are attached to the pot-houses. 

The better class of artisans and shopkeepers in a small way 
are principally the frequenters of the discussion halls. Mechan- 
ics with a gift of the gab, and who have five or six shillings a 
week to spend out of twenty-five or thirty, are to be found here 
in large numbers. The Most Worthy Grand and the Vice Grand 
are paid a fixed salary for their stated eloquence, and it is 
principally their duty to read all the cheap weeklies and dai- 



88 DEBATING CLUBS AND COGER S HALL. 

lies, not forgcttiiij^ the Times, which is very often quoted by 
them as a sort of a clincher in tlie argument brought up. A 
phiee like tliis will take in five pounds of a night, and the 
wages paid to llic bar maids is about sixteen shillings a week. 
There were two here, and four waiters, who receive sixteen 
pounds a year and their " grub," as they call it. A small pa- 
per of rough-cut tobacco is furnished to each customer for a 
penny, and the consumption of this narcotic and Welsh Rabbits 
is encouraged, as they arc quite certain to make the custom- 
ers dry, and this dryness, as a matter of course, leads to the 
imljibition of plenteous beer and gin and water. These shops 
are licensed to sell spirits under the new Beer act, and they 
are compelled to shut off the debate at midnight. As a gen- 
eral thing the most advanced liberalism prevails in these 
places, and religious sentiments are below par with the audi- 
ence. Very often it is possible to hear a well educated or sci- 
entific man debating in these halls, but, on closer survey, his 
accent will Ijctray him to be some impoverished French or 
German physician, or reduced savan, who has no occupation in 
the hours of the evening, and can, therefore, afford to dis- 
pense wisdom to the thick-headed audience, gratis. 

A])0ut a week after my visit to Cogers Hall I went, accom- 
panied by Mr. Marsh, a member of the Daily Morning Tele- 
graph's staff, and another gentleman connected with the edito- 
rial management of the Pall Mall Gazette, to take a look at 
an(jther debating hall which is situated at No. 16 Fleet street. 
This place is quite famous in London for the virulence of its 
debates and the high flavor of its gin. Its Brown Stout is also 
aljovc reproach. 

As usual in all such places there is a public bar here, and 
this is located at the entrance, and is attended by the inevita- 
ble barmaid, smiling and bedizined in all the glory of a two 
guinea silk dress, bought perhaps in Regent street or the Oxford 
Circus. 

Tlic room here was not so large a one as that at Cogers Hall 
in which the orators were in the habit of haranguing their audi- 
tors. There were a dozen small tables, around which chairs 



" WHERE ARE WE NOW." 89 

were placed in a most picturesque confusion. Small white pla- 
cards printed in blue ink were posted on the walls with the fol- 
lowing announcement : 

TEMPLE 

DISCUSSION FORUM. 

ADMISSION FREE. 

STRANGERS ARE PARTICULARLY INVITED TO TAKE PART 

IN THE DISCUSSION AND TO INTRODUCE SUBJECTS 

FOR DEBATE. 

THE QUESTION THIS WEDNESDAY EVENING WILL BE 

" THE POPE'S MODEL LETTER," 
WHERE ARE WE NOW ? 

TO BE OPENED BY "A PROTESTANT." 

CHAIR TO BE TAKEN AT NINE O'CLOCK. 

SUPPER FROM EIGHT TILL TWELVE. 

BEDS. PRIVATE SITTING-ROOMS. 

There was a venerable looking old fellow in the chair when 
we entered the Discussion Forum, who lifted a pair of gold 
rimmed spectacles from his nose to take a look at us. This 
was the chairman of the meeting, and shortly after we sat 
down he cried out to a tall person with a short grey raglan 
coat who was speaking and perspiring at the same time. 

"Mister Chowley I will and cannot allow you, sir, to trample 
on the religious feelings of any man present in this harmonious 
meeting. We are all brothers here, sir, and the individual 
who disturbs our peace and quietness, should be to us all as the 
' 'Eathen and the publican, sir.' (Hear, hear.) 

The tall man with the raglan, who did not like to be sup- 
pressed so easily, had taken his seat for a moment much against 
his will, but now he arose slowly and scornfully looking around 
him, spoke, with one hand leaning on a chair behind him, and 
another hand in his breast, as follows : 

" Gentlemen, this his an age of science if it is an age of 
hanythink. Wot does my honorable and noble Roman Catho- 
lic friend wish to advance has an argument. Does he mean to 



00 DEBATING CLUBS AND COGERS HALL. 

tell ME, with my lieyes hopen in this here blessed Nineteenth 
Century, which we are all so proud of, and whose blessed light 
is the moving cause of so much mental brilliancy — does he 
mean t<» tell mc for a moment that the miracle of the transpo- 
sition of water into Avine at the wedding of Cana wos han 
hactual fact. Why gents it his altogether impossible — and no 
reasonable man in this Nineteenth century can for a moment 
believe it possible. Wot would Galileo, Kepler, Faraday or sich 
bright lights of the Nineteenth century say to sich stories ? 
Why gents, there is a chemical change which would have to 
take })lace before such a translation, and this chemical trans- 
f(3rmation could not take place without the assistance of other 
sul)stances. (Hear, hear.) And gents, as far as the infalli- 
bility of the Pope is concerned, why I have only to say in the 
words of the poet, hand I mention no names, that a piece of 
fat pork might stick in his gullet as soon as it w^ould stick in 
mine, and that's all I think of infallibility and fat pork, with 
the blessed light of the nineteenth century before me." 
(Hear, hear.) 

Mr. Chowlcy here sat down, thoroughly satisfied with him- 
self and auditory, who applauded him to the echo. Then a 
member of the Roman Catholic persuasion answered him in a 
long and si)lendid oration, which seemed to thoroughly con- 
vince every one present that the Catholic side was right, and 
the Protestant one a most diabolical doctrine. After each man 
liad done his little speech, it was curious, nay amusing, to hear 
the adherents of cither party comment upon the previous argu- 
ment. 

" Oh ! I say," said a Presbyterian, " didn't he smash the old 
Pope neither." 

"And wot a blessing he gave His Grace, Archbishop Man- 
ning, though ? " 

" Well," said an ardent Irishman, " I niver heard such a 1am- 
beastin as the heretics got to night." 

" You might well say that, Pether, and didn't he scald Mar- 
tin Luther with the holy wather, though," said an honest look- 
ing, hard working fellow who sat smoking a pipe. 



FARCE AND TRAGEDY. 



91 



One thing struck me in all this wilderness of argument and 
polemic discussion. While the two principals nearly argued 
their jaws off in the heat of discussion, they failed miserably 
to convert any of the opposite party, who sat the debate out 
with a heroic stupidity, understanding with much difficulty 
about one-third of what was said, and perhaps caring very lit- 
tle for the matter in hand, but sticking to their prejudices to 
the last, with a partisan fidelity not to be convinced by all the 
harangues that will take place from that night until the Day 
of Judgment. 

And yet I could not enter a place of this kind in all Lon- 
don, from Temple Bar to Hammersmith, without hearing this 
same everlasting religious warfare of controversy. 

And to add to the joke, hardly one of five of these persons 
who attend such discussions, were ever in a church of either 
the Catholic or Protestant persuasion. 

Such is life — part farce, part tragedy. 





CHAPTER VII. 

THE CLUBS AND CLUB HOUSES OF LONDON. 



E cannot conceive of any greater contrast than 
that which exists between the wretchedness 
and squalor of the lodging houses, and the 
'^^ splendor and refined elegance, combined with 
^^llS^i^ X3^^ comfort of the Club houses of London, which 
are chiefly situated in Pall Mall, St. James street, and the 
neighl)orhood of lower Regent street. 

Club life has attained its greatest perfection in London. No 
city upon the Continent can compare with it for the number of 
its club houses, the splendor of their architecture, their luxu- 
rious furniture, and the standing in society of their members. 

There are, I believe, upward of fifty clubs in London, in 
which all the professions, and all the stations of life find repre- 
sentation, with a roll of perhaps 45,000 members. The follow- 
ing are the principal clubs with the cost of ground and con- 
struction : Army and Navy Club, George's street, St. James' 
square, 1,450 members, .£100,000 ; the Conservative Club, St. 
James' street, 1,500 members, .£81,000; Garrick Club, King 
street. Convent Garden, 500 members, £25,000; Junior 
United Service Club, corner of Charles and Regent streets, 
1,500 members, .£75,000; Oxford and Cambridge Club, Pall 
Mall, 1,200 members, X100,000 ; Reform Club, 1,400 members, 
£120,000; University Club, Pall Mall East, 500 members, 
£20,000; Wyndham Club, St. James' square, 600 members, 
£30,000; Westminster Club, Albcanarlc street, 560 members, 
£15,000; Athenajum, Pall Mall, 1,200 members, £60,000; 



INTERESTING STATISTICS. 



93 



Carlton, Pall Mall, 800 members, £100,000; Guards Club, 
Pall Mall, 500 members, £40,000; Oriental, Hanover square, 
800 members, £30,000; Traveler's, Pall Mall, 700 mem- 
bers, £30,000; Union, Cockspur street, 1,000 members, 
£25,000; United Service Club, Pall Mall, 1,500 members, 
£70,000; White's Club, St. James' street, 550 members, £20,- 
000; Boodles, St. James' street, 500 members, £15,000; Cav- 
endish Club, 307 Regent street, 500 members, £15,000; and 
Civil Service Club, 86 St. James' street, 1,000 members, 
£45,000. 

Besides the before-mentioned clubs there are the followins;, 
which rank nearly but not quite as high among Club men : 



Albert Club, 15 George street, Hanover square, 

Alpine Club, Trafalgar square, - - . 

Arlington Club, 4 Arlington street. 

Arts Club, 17 Hanover square, - - _ 

Arundel Club, 12 Salisbury street. Strand, 

City of London Club, 19 old Broad street, (merchants,) 

Gresham Club, City, (bankers, &c.,) 

Junior Athenajum Club, 29 King street, St. James, - 

Junior Carlton Club, 14 Regent street, - - - 

New Carlton Club, Albemarle street, 

New University Club, 57 St. James' street, 

Portland Club, Stratford Place, Oxford street, 

Smithfield Club, Half-Moon street, Piccadilly - 

St. James' Club, 54 St. James' street, 

Whitehall Club, Parliament street, . . . 

Whittington Club, 37 Arundel street, 

Clarendon Club, 86 St. James' street, - - - 

Junior Reform Club, Albemarle street, 

Brooks' Club, 60 St. James' street, - - - 

Arthur's Club, 69 St. James' street, - - - 

Law Society, Chancery Lane, - - - - 

National, "Whitehall-Gardens, ... 

Prince's Racket and Tennis Club, Hans Place, Chelsea, 

United University, corner Suffolk street and Pall Mall, 

Beefsteak Society, Lyceum Theatre, - - - 

Club Chambers, Regent street, - - - 

" " St. James' square, » - - 

Ambassador's, 106 Piccadilly, - ■ . 

Erectheum, St. James's square, - - - - 



HEUBHRS. 


COST. 


500 


£10,000 


600 


18,000 


400 


16,000 


500 


16,000 


600 


52,000 


1,000 


50,000 


1,000 


60,000 


800 


30,000 


800 


40,000 


800 


25,000 


600 


29,000 


400 


18,000 


300 


12,000 


600 


23,000 


500 


9,000 


1,600 


40,000 


900 


36,000 


800 


40,000 


575 


20,000 


600 


18,000 


1,000 


68,000 


400 


17,000 


300 


11.000 


500 


33,000 


250 


5,000 


400 


31,000 


300 


1 7,000 


200 


16,000 


300 


20,000 



94 THE CLUH3 AND CLUB HOUSES OF LONDON. 

In these several clubs each member is elected by ballot, and 
pays an entrance on admission, and afterward an annual sub- 
scription, wliich varies like entrance fees in different clubs. 

Thus, in the Atlienasum, the entrance fee is <£ 26.5s., annual 
subscription, M.Gs. Arthur's, entrance £21, subscription, 
XIO lOs. Brooks, entrance, £9 9s., subscription, Xll lis. 
Carlton, entrance, X15 15s., annual subscription, ,£10 10s. Con- 
servative Club, <£28 7s., subscription, .£8 8s. Garrick Club, 
entrance, X21, subscription, £Q Gs. Junior United Service, 
entrance, £30, subscription £G. Oxford and Cambridge Club, 
entrance, <£21 5s., subscription, £6 6s. Reform Club, en- 
trance, .£21 5s., subscription, £10 10s. Travelers' Club, en- 
trance, .£31 10s. Union, entrance, <£38 10s., subscription, 
£6 Gs. United Service Club, entrance, £36, subscription, £G. 
Whittington, entrance, £10 10s., subscription, ladies £1, 
gentlemen, £2 2s. Wyndham, entrance, £27 6s., subscription, 
£8. 

When clubs were first started they were regarded with much 
hostility as being most antagonistic to domestic life, and the 
ladies displayed an intense spirit against them. The clubs, 
however, survived and flourished' under their enmity, and it 
was found that they discouraged coarse drunkenness, the prev- 
alent vice of Englishmen ; encouraged social intercourse — of 
which ladies partook of elsewhere ; refined the manners of the 
members, constituted courts of honor, and tended most mate- 
rially to the manufacture of gentlemen. 

The London clubs are private hotels on a vast and magnifi- 
cent scale. They have billiard rooms, coffee rooms, nine-pin 
rooms, splendid libraries, saloons, and furniture, and plate of 
the costliest and rarest description. 

All the refreshment which a member has, whether breakfast, 
dinner, supper, or wine, are furnished to him at the market 
cost price, all other expenses being defrayed from the an- 
nual subscri])tions. For a few pounds a year, advantages are 
to be had, which no incomes but the most ample could pro- 
cure. The Athenffium, which consists of twelve hundred mem- 
bers, can Ijc taken as a good example of the rest. Among the 



LUXURIOUS DINNER LADIES EXCLUDED. 95 

members can be reckoned a large proportion of the most emi- 
nent persons in England — civil, military, and ecclesiastical, 
peers, spiritual and temporal, commoners, men of the learned 
professions, those connected with the sciences and arts, and 
commerce, as well as the distinguished who do not belong to 
any particular class, and who have nothing to do but live on 
their means, bore their tailors, and admire their family gen- 
ealogy, and their own figures. These men are to be met with 
day after day at the clubs, living with more freedom and non- 
chalance than they could at their own houses. For six or 
eight guineas a year every niember has the command of an 
excellent library, with maps, the daily London papers, English 
and foreign periodicals, and every material for writing, with a 
flock of gorgeous flunkies, in powder and epaulettes, to attend 
at the nod of a member, and a host of youthful pages in buttons 
and broadcloths. The club is a sort of a palace with the com- 
fort of a private dwelling, and every member is a master with- 
out having the trouble of a master. He can have whatever 
meat or refreshment he desires served up at all hours, with 
luxury and dispatch. There is a fixed place for everything, 
and it is not customary to remain long at table. You can dine 
alone, or you can invite a dozen persons to dine with you, fe- 
males being excluded. From an account kept at the Athenaeum 
for one year, it appears that 17,323 dinners cost on an average 
2s. 9-|cZ. each, and the average quantity of wine drank by each 
person at these dinners was a small fraction more than a pint 
for each. The bath accommodations are the finest that can 
be imagined. 

The kitchen of the London clubs cannot be equaled in the 
world, and the chief cooks who have charge of the kitchens, 
have each an European fame. Alexis Soyer, the greatest cook 
since Ude or Yatel, had, for a long time, the charge of the 
kitchen of the Reform Club, and the kitchen of this club, of 
which John Bright, and all the leaders of the English liberals 
are members, is the finest in London. 

A description of this kitchen will in a measure answer for 



96 THE CLUBS AND CLUB HOUSES OF LONDON. 

that of any other London club, and I will give it here for the 
information of those who are curious in such matters. 

The kitchen, properly so called, is an apartment of moderate 
size, surrounded on all four sides by smaller rooms, which form 
the pastry, the poultry, the butchery, the scullery, and other 
sul)ordinate ()ffi3es. There are doorways but no doors, between 
the dillercnt rooms, all of which are formed in such a manner 
that the chief cook, from one particular spot, can command a 
view of tlie whole. In the centre of the kitchen is a table and 
a hot closet, where various knicknacks are prepared and kept 
to a desired heat, the closet being brought to any required 
temperature by admitting steam beneath it. Around the hot 
closet is a bench or table, fitted with drawers and other con- 
veniences for culinary operations. A passage going around 
the four sides of this table separates it from the various cook- 
ing apparatus, which involve all that modern ingenuity has 
brought to bear on the cuisine. 

In the first place there are two enormous fire-places for roast- 
ing, each of which would, in sober truth, roast a whole sheep. 
The screens placed before these fires are so arranged as to re- 
flect back almost the entire heat which falls upon them, and 
effectually shields the kitchen from the intense heat which 
would be otherwise thrown out. Then again, these screens 
are so provided with shelves and recesses as to bring into pro- 
fitable use the radiant heat which would be otherwise wasted. 

Along two sides of the room are ranges of charcoal fires for 
broiling and stewing, and other apparatus for other varieties 
of cooking. These are at a height of about three feet from the 
ground. The broiling fires are a kind of open pot or pan, 
throwing upward a fierce but blazeless heat ; behind them is a 
framework by which gridirons may be fixed at any height 
above the fire, according to the intensity of the heat. Other 
fires open only at the top, are adapted for various kinds of pans 
and vessels ; and in some cases a polished tin-reflector is so 
placed as to reflect back to the viands the heat. Under and 
behind and over and around, are pipes, tanks, and cisterns, in 



MODEL KITCHEN. 97 

abundance, containing water to be heated, or to be used more 
directly in the processes of cooking. 

A boiler adjacent to the kitchen is expressly appropriated to 
the supply of steam for " steaming," for heating the hot closets, 
the hot iron plates and other apparatus. In another small room 
the meat is kept, chopped, cut, and otherwise prepared for the 
kitchen. There are also in the pastry room all the necessary 
appliances for preparing the lightest and most luscious triumphs 
of the art. In another room there are drawers in the bottoms 
of which blocks of ice are laid, and above these are placed arti- 
cles of undressed food, which must necessarily be kept cool. 

There is a cheerful air, an air of magnificence about these 
superb kitchens, which would charm a good housewife. Here 
all the genius that can be brought to bear upon cookery is con- 
centrated, and the head cook would not deign to notice any 
person of less rank than a baronet, while in superintendence. 
Although there are twelve hundred members or over, yet he is 
not responsible to any individual one, and the only authority in 
the club to which he has to bow is the eight or ten members 
of the House Committee, whose decrees even to this great be- 
ing are arbitrary. 

The pots and pans are of an exceeding brightness, and the 
entire system is perfect. In one corner of the kitchen is a lit- 
tle stall or counting-house, at a desk in which sits the "Clerk 
of the Kitchen." Every day the chief cook provides, besides 
ordinary provisions which are certain to be required, a selected 
list which he inserts in his bill of fare — a list which is left to 
his judgment and skill. 

Say three or four gentlemen, members of the club, deter- 
mine to dine there at a given hour, they select from the bill of 
fare, or make a separate "order" if preferred, or leave the 
dinner altogether to the intellect of the chef, who is sure to be 
flattered by this dependence on his judgment. A little slip 
of paper on which is written the names of tlie dishes and the 
hour of dining, is hung on a hook in the kitchen on a black 
board, where there are a number of hooks devoted to different 
hours of the day or evening. The cooks proceed with their 



98 CLUBS AND CLUB HOUSES OP LONDON. 

avocations, and by the time the dinner is ready the clerk of 
the kitchen has calculated and entered the exact value of every 
article composing it, which entry is made out in the form of a 
bill — the cost price being tliat by which the charge is regulated 
— nothing is ever charged for the cooking. Immediately at 
the elbow of the clerk are bells and speaking tubes, by which 
he can communicate with the servants in the other parts of 
the building. 

Mcanwliile a steam engine is " serving up " the dinner. In 
one corner of the kitchen is a recess, on opening a door in 
which we see a small platform, square-shaped, calculated to 
hold an ordinary sized tray. This platform is connected with 
the shaft of a steam engine by bands and wheels, so as to be 
elevated through a kind of vertical trunk leading to the upper 
part of the building ; and here are the white-aproned servants 
or waiters ready to take out the hot and luscious smelling 
viands from the platform, to the member or members of the 
club who are anxiously awaiting dinner. 

Architecturally speaking the club houses are the finest build- 
ings in London, and in the west end of the town, and in the 
vicinity of the parks they do much to beautify the city ; these 
massive, richly decorated, and pillared palaces of exclusiveness. 

The " Heavy Swell " Club of all London is the " Guards " in 
Pall Mall. There are three or four regiments of the Queen's 
Household Brigade stationed always in London to guard the 
sacred person of the Queen, and it is from the officers 
of these crack regiments that the members of the club are 
balloted for. These fellows are supposed to bathe in cham- 
pagne, and dine off rose water ; they are afraid to carry an 
umbrella tliicker than a walking stick, they hate "low people," 
and devote their existence to killing time, yet are withal sen- 
sitive, honorable in many things, (except paying their grocers, 
wine and habcrdashing bills,) and will fight as becomes the de- 
scendants of the men who dyed the sands at Hastings with 
tlioir blood, to bequeath a rich and fruitful kingdom to those 
wlio now inherit it. 

The Conservative Club is frequented by those athletic and 



THE CONSEEVATIVE AND GARRICK CLUBS. 



99 




CONSLRVATIVE CLUB HOUSE. 



slo"W going squires and gentlemen who are always ready to ap- 
plaud Mr. Disraeli in the House of Commons, and are willing 
to serve as special constaldes on days when the English 
democracy become restive 
and open their eyes to tlie 
fact of tlieir being plun- 
dered and robbed every day 
of their lives. It was from 
tlie Conservative Club that 
Mr. Granville Murray was 
expelled by the secret influ- 
ence of the moral Prince 
of Wales, simply because 
following his duty as a jour- 
nalist he had told the hered- 
itary regulators of Eng- 
land tliat they were out of place in the nineteenth century. 

Tlie Garrick Club is, as its name indicates, made up of ar- 
tists, dramatists, actors, newspaper writers, and authors. It 
numbers among its members Charles Reade, Tom Taylor, 
Charles Dickens, Bulwer, Wilkie Collins, xVnthony Trollope, 
Andrew Halliday, George Augustus Sala, Mr. Delane of the 
Times, H. Sutherland Edwards, William Howard Russell, Ed- 
ward Dicey, Thornton Hunt, Editor of the Telegraphy John 
Ruskin, and I believe Thomas Caiiyle's name was proposed as 
an honorary member ; Charles Kean, Thackeray, Charles Mat- 
thews, Sr., wlio founded the club, W. H. Ainsworth, the novel- 
ist, the Blanchards, the Mayhews, Samuel Lover, Charles Lev- 
er, John Oxenford, Louis Blanc, Walter Thornbury, Lasccllcs 
Wraxall, Edmund Yates, Jolin Hollingshead, formerly critic 
of the Daily News^ James Greenwood, Frederick Greenwood, 
Brough, Dudley Costello, Lord William Lennox, Thomas Mil- 
ler, Cyrus Redding, and otlier well known literary men belong 
to or have at some period or another been members of 
this club. American authors, artists, and actors, arc always 
welcomed licre, and among the habitues of the Garrick may 
be found Lester Wallack, H. E. Bateman, and others. The 
7 



100 THE CLUBS AND CLUB HOUSES OP LONDON. 

Garrick is noivd for its famous gin punch which is a specialty 
here, and for which the following ingredients arc necessary to 
composition ; pour lialf a pint of gin on the outer peel of a 
lemon, then a little lemon juice, a glass of maraschino, a pint 
and a quarter of water, and two bottles of iced soda water. 
This is a most fragrant puncli and not very intoxicating. 
The collection of pictures at the Garrick is very fine, and em- 
braces nearly all the people, both male and female, who have 
made themselves famous in English histrionic art, among whom 
may be noticed Elliston,:Macklin, Peg Woffington, Nell Gwynne, 
Collcy Cibl)er, Mrs. Bracegirdle, Garrick as Richard III, John 
Phillip and Charles Keml)le, Charles Mathews, Mrs. Siddons, 
■Macrcady, Miss Inchbald, Edmund Kcan, Kitty Clive, Mrs. 
Billington, and various otliors. Some of these portraits have 
been painted by the first of English artists. This gallery is only 
rivalled by that in Evan's Supper House in Convent Garden, 
where there is a fine and similar collection. 

The Reform Club has among its members John Bright, W. 
E. Gladstone, Lord Hatlicrley, the present Lord Chancellor of 
England, the Duke of Argyll, W. E. Forster, Lord DufFerin, 
and other well known liberal nobles. About a year ago John 
Bright and W. E. Forster, his able aide-camp, resigned from 
the membership of the Reform Club, owing to the fact that a 
correspondent of an American journal, proposed by them, had 
had been black-balled in the Reform Club. This correspondent 
was Geo. . W. Smalley of the New York Tribune. I believe 
that the club reconsidered their decision and admitted Mr. 
Smalley, and Mr. Bright and Mr. Forster are now members 
of the club. Sir Charles Wentworth Dilke, editor of the Ath- 
enceum, is a member of the Reform Club. 

The Carlton Club ranks high among the Tory or anti-liberal 
clu1)s of London, lias a very rich proprietary and a magnificent 
edifice in Pall ]\rall. The Right Hon. Spencer Horatio Wal- 
pole, one of the members for Cambridge University, and Alex- 
ander Beresford Hope, one of the proprietors of the Saturday 
Review, who was a member of Parliament during the Ameri- 
can Civil War, and a bitter foe of the North, are both mem- 



CARLTON CLUB. 



101 




CARLTOX CLUB HOUSii. 



bers of the Carlton Club, as is also Lord John Manners, a 
prominent Conservative noble, and fifth son of the Duke of 
Rutland. John Laird, M. P. for Liverpool, the builder of the 
Alabama, is also a member of the Carlton Club. 

Lord Cole, a son of the Earl of Enskillen, and a chief ac- 
complice with the Prince 
of Wales in the Lady Mor- 
daunt scandal, is a mem- 
ber of the Carlton. 

Gregory, the member 
for Galway, also a sympa- 
thizer with the Slavehold- 
er's Rebellion, belongs to 
the Carlton. To be brief, 
this Carlton Club, essen- 
tially aristocratic and in- 
imical to democracy all 
over the world, contribu- 
ted more individual moneyed and social influence and support 
to Jeff. Davis than all the London Clubs put together. 

I might state here that Bass, the great East India Pale Ale 
man, is a member of the Reform Club, while Sir Arthur Guin- 
ess, the Dublin Brown Stout man, Bass's great rival, is a 
member of the National Club, which is psuedo liberal. Jona- 
than Pim, the rich Irish Quaker, a member for Dublin City like 
Guiness, does not belong to any London club and keeps away 
from the flesh pots of Egypt. John Francis Maguire, M. P. 
for Cork, is a member of the Stafford Club, which numbers 
some of the Catholic families in its roll of membership. Sir 
Patrick O'Brien, an amusing Irishman Avho frequents the Cre- 
orne a good deal, belongs to the Reform Club. The present 
Earl of Derby, late Lord Stanley, who was expected to lead the 
liberals in the House of Lords, but does not give much promise 
of doing so while he is an active member of the Carlton Club. 

Tlie Right Hon. George Goschen, a Jewish merchant, who 
is President of the Poor Law Board, yet quite a young man 
and promising, has his name inscribed on the lists of the Reform 



102 



THE CLUBS AND CLUB HOUSES OF LONDON. 



and Allicnajum Clubs, and Robert Lowe, the witty, sarcastic, 
and clcar-lioadod Chancellor of Exchequer, are lights in the 
Reform Club. Edward Sullivan, the Irish Attorney General, 
may be seen at tlic Reform, and George Henry Moore, a coun- 
tryman of his, and an apologist for the Fenians, is a ha]> 
itue of Brook's Club in St. James street. Sir John Evelyn 
Dennison, the Speaker of the House of Commons, while in 
town during the session, when dinner time comes, always doffs 
his gown and wig and toddles around to the Reform Club for a 
chop or steak, and a glass of wine. Vernon Harcourt, who 
signs himself in tlie Times " Plistoricus," represents Oxford 

Borough in the House of 
Commons, and is a member 
of the Oxford and Cam- 
bridge University Clnb. A 
good story is told of " His- 
toricus." Three heavy 
swells of the Guards were 
dining at the Star and Gar- 
ter at Richmond, and all 
three made a wager that 
they each could boast of 
the biggest bore in London 
as an acquaintance. The 
discussion wore high, and 
they agreed to test it by bringing each his bore to dine on a 
set day, and at a set hour, at the " Star and Garter." When 
the day came two close carriages were drawn up to the " Star 
and Garter," and out of each leaped one of the gentlemen who 
had made the wager. They were both disappointed in their 
bores, and came without them as they had previous engagements. 
A third carriage drove up, and out of it leaped the third Swell 
who had made the wager, with a tall gentleman in a cloak. 
As soon as the stranger uncovered and presented the smiling 
countenance of " Historicus," the two SAvells cried out in as- 
tonishment, 

'' By J-a-a-v ye knaw, that's not f-ch-ah — he's got our bo-a-h!'' 




OXFORD AND CAMnHIDGE CLUB HOUSE. 



BEEFSTEAK CLUB. 103 

Whalley, the religious madman, belongs to the Reform 
Club, and so does the Right Hon. Hugh Childers, First Lord 
of the Admiralty. 

Kinglake, the historian, who bribed his way into the Plouse 
of Commons, and afterwards testified to it without shame, is a 
member of Brooks, tlie Travelers, the AtheuEeum, and the Ox- 
ford and Cambridge Clubs. 

Sir Robert Peel, the member for Farnsworth, is to be found 
at Brook's and Boodle's. Sir Henry Lytton Bulwer, formerly 
ambassador at Wasliington, at the Reform Club. Layard, the 
Nineveh discoverer and now English ambassador at Madrid, 
belongs to the Athenaeum Club. The O'Donoughue at the Staf- 
ford and Reform Clubs, while young Mr. Gladstone, son to the 
Premier, modestly drinks his wine at the New University Club. 
Lord Carrington, a boon companion of the Prince of Wales, is 
a member of the Guards Club, and Sir Francis Crossley, the 
great Yorkshire manufacturer, may be seen nightly during the 
session passing his hours in the Reform and Brook's Clubs. 

Queer and strange reminiscences cling to the London Clubs 
like barnacles to a packet ship. At the Alfred Club, George 
Canning, one of the greatest men ever known in England, used 
to take a steak and onions alongside of Lord Byron, who was 
always partial to Madeira negus. 

Louis Napoleon, in his cheerless and hard up days, ate his 
eighteenpenny dinner at the Army and Navy Club in silence, 
Avliile aristocratic Englishmen sat around chaffing and joking 
and taking no part in the sorrows of the exiled nephew of his 
Uncle. Since then dynasties have changed, and now a mag- 
nificent piece of Gobelin tapestry work, the " Sacrifice of Di- 
ana," worthy to be the gift of a sovereign, hangs in the club 
house of which he was once a member. The Emperor pre- 
sented it to (lie Clulj. 

The stock of wine in the cellars of the xVlhcna?um is worth 
about 830,000, and is never allowed to run down or deteriorate, 
and its yearly revenue amounts to about $50,000. 

The Beefsteak Club is a coterie of choice S])irits M-ho meet 
over the Lyceum Theatre to eat beefsteaks and drink tobys 



104 



CLUBS AND CLUB HOUSES OF LONDON. 




UNITED 8ERTICE CLUB. 



of ale, each mcml)cr brinu-ino; his own l)ccfstcak and furnishincr 
his own jokes. Several noblemen belong to it, and the Presi- 
dent wears as his emblem of office, a golden gridiron. Peg 
Woffington Avas at one time a member of this club. 
The Duke of Wellington was in the habit of dining at the 

United Service Club, in 
Pall Mall, off the roast 
joint of beef or mutton, 
and one day he was charg- 
ed Is. 8d. for his plate of 
meat instead of Is., the 
proper charge. He de- 
clared he would not pay 
the extra three-pence, and 
denounced the swindle 
until the three-pence was 
deducted, when the old 
soldier became satisfied 
and said that he would have paid the extra charge, but that he 
did not wish to establish an unjust precedent whereby others 
might suffer. 

Just one hundred years ago a man dropped down at the door 
of White's Club, which is still flourishing in St. James' St., and 
the crowd of loungers in tlie bow windows immediately began to 
lay wagers whether the man was dead or not. A charitable 
person suggested that he be bled, but those who had wagered 
refused to allow it, saying that it would affect the fairness of 
the bet. In 1814, a banquet was given to the allied sovereigns 
at White's, which cost over $50,000 of American money, and 
the next year after a banquet was given to the Duke of Wel- 
lington wliicli cost ^2,480 10s. dd. George IV^ and Chester- 
field, tlic master of politeness, were members of White's Club. 
During the hard winter of 1844, the aristocratic clubs of 
London contril)uted to the starving poor of the metropolis, 
S,104 ])ounds of broken bread, 4,550 pounds of broken meat, 
1,147 pints of. tea-leaves, and 1,158 pints of coffee-grounds. 
Otlierwise these leavings might have been given to swine to 
fatten them. 



I 



DEMOCRATIC CLUB. LADIES ADMITTED. 105 

Gambling was carried on to a very liigli pitch at one time in 
the London clubs, but many have mended within twenty years. 
Crockford's Club House, No. 50 St. James' street, was known 
all over the world, and kings, princes, ambassadors, and states- 
men, were inscribed upon its rolls as members. It no longer 
exists, however. 

Crockford started in life as a fishmonger, in the old bulk- 
shop next door to Temple Bar Without, which he quitted for 
"play" in St. James'. He began by taking Watier's old club- 
house, where ho set up a hazard-bank, and won a great deal of 
money; he then sepai-ated from his partner, who had a bad 
year, and failed. Crockford now removed to St. James' street, 
had a good year, and built the magnificent club house which 
bore his name ; the decorations alone are said to have cost him 
.£94,000. The election of the club members was vested in a 
committee ; the house appointments were superb, and Ude was 
engaged as mattre dlwlel. " Crockford's " now became the 
high fashion. Card-tables were reg-ularly placed, and whist 
was played occasionally; but the aim, end, and final cause of 
the whole was the hazard-bank, at which the proprietor took 
his nightly stand, prepared for all comers. His speculation 
was eminently successful. During several years, everything 
that anybody had to lose and cared to risk was swallowed up ; 
and Crockford became a millionaire. He retired in 1840, 
"much as an Indian chief retires from a hunting-country when 
there is not game enough left for his tribe;" and the Club then 
tottered to its fall. After Crockford's death, the lease of the 
club-house (thirty-two years, rent £1,400) was sold for £2,900. 
The Whittington Club is the only democratic club in Lon- 
don. It was started twenty-four years ago by Douglas Jerrold, 
who became its first president. It combines a literary societ}', 
with a club house, upon an economical scale, and contains din- 
ing and coffee rooms, library and reading rooms, smoking and 
chess rooms, and a large hall for balls, concerts, and soirees. 
Lectures are given here, and classes are held for the higher 
branches of education, fencing, dancing, etc. Ladies have all 



106 



CLUBS AND CLUB UOUSES OP LONDON. 



the privileges of gentlemen or members in the restaurant, and 
in balloting, Avhilc their dues and subscriptions is half that of 
the male members. This is the largest club in London, and 
comljines all classes, having a roll of 1,700 members, all of 
whom arc to be considered active. The Whittington Club is 
the only one in London where a person may be proposed with- 
out having a crest, or without belonging to a " good family," 
which means to loaf or idle a life away, and live upon the 
bread which is furnished by the blood and sweat of what these 
dandy Club men call the " lowah closses." 




■ 




CHAPTER YIIL 

THE ABBEY-CHURCH OF WESTMINSTER. 

HIS is the Pantheon of England's Greatest 
Dead. As I stand here under the groined 
roof of this vast and glorious Nave, with 
the sunbeams streaming in through rose 
windows, and falling softly on sculptured 
figures and tombs of Kings and Queens long 
mouldering in the dust, their bodies recum- 
bent in monumental brass, their hands clasped as in prayer, 
with heroes, and poets, and statesmen, law-givers, and royal 
murderers, lying silently around me on either hand, and under 
my feet beneath the worn and antique stones which form the 
pavement, I realize that I am in the Valhalla of the Anglo- 
Norman Race, a race that has been prolific of strong wills, 
great minds, and heroic deeds. 

This is the most sacred spot in all Great Britain, this spot 
enclosed by the four walls of Westminster Abbey. It does 
not seem an edifice raised by human hands, rather would it 
appear, as I look to the roof, supported by most marvelous 
pillars, resembling an interlaced avenue of royal forest trees, 
that it had been constructed by beings of another world. 

It was a grand faith that inspired Westminster Abbey, a 
faith that believed in sacrificing all earthly aspirations for the 
honor and glory of God. 

Thus musing I am interrupted by a tap on the shoulder, as I 
stand leaning against a pillar in the gloom of the vast pile. 

" Would you like to see the Habbey, sir ? — its sixpence to 
see the Chapels — there's nine on 'em ; the Hambulatory, the 



108 THE ABBEY-CHURCH OP WESTMINSTER. 

Nave, Transept, Choir, Chapels, and Cloisters, are free — beau- 
tiful sijjflit.s — only sixpence, sir." 

I turned, and saw a man in a black fustian gown, bareheaded, 
with a tall thin stick in his right hand ; he was old, and seemed 
to need its frail support. Tliis was a prebendary's "Verger," a 
sort of a porter or Abbey guide, whose main object was to col- 
lect as many sixpences as possible, but ostensibly he was a cice- 
rone of the monuments and architectural beauties of the Cathe- 
dral Church of St. Peter's, Westminster. 

Numbers of visitors were straying in and out of the Abbey, 
looking at the monuments, criticising the works of art, the 
mural tablets, or gossiping over the ashes of dead Kings, as if 
they were in a concert room, while here and there might be 
seen some scholar or learned man delving for facts, and poring 
over tlie musty Latin of the crumbling tombs. 

In Westminster Abbey rival statesmen rest in peace, the 
tongue of the orator is mute, side by side rest the Crowned 
head and the Chancellor with his great seal, the Archbishop 
and tlic Phiy-actor, the pliilanthropist and the seaman, who died 
by his guns on the deck of the vessel of war, the divine and 
the i)hysician, the Princess and the Soubrette, all mingle com- 
mon dust together. 

In Westminster Abbey, the powerful, spiritual, Roman Cath- 
olic prelate has celebrated Higli Mass with more than Eastern 
magnificence, the Introit has issued forth from his lips, and 
the acolytes have answered his " Dominus Vobiscum " with 
tlieir "Amen;" and here the stern Puritan has knelt in. his 
less formal prayer. 

Here the dread sentence of excommunication has been 
launched forth in all its terrors from the lips of Papal legates, 
enthroned, and in Abbot John Estney's room Caxton printed 
the first English Bible. 

Here the magnificence and pomps of the coronation of a King 
have been followed by the solemn and beautiful burial service 
for the dead, and the pealing organ, and the swelling choir, 
reverl)erating through the lofty grey-grown aisles, have chained 
men's minds to the power of Almighty God. 



DIMENSIONS OF THE ABBEY. 



109 



Westminster Abbey is the finest and noblest specimen of 
Gothic architecture in all England. 




WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 



Its dimensions are 



Exterior. — Length fi-om oast to west, including walls, but exclusive of 

Henry VII's Chapel, - - - - _ 416 

Height of the West Tower to top of pinnacles, - 225 

Interior. — Length within the walls to the piers of Henry VII's Chapel, 383 



Breadth at the Transept, - 
Nave. — Length, _ - - _ 

Breadth, - - - - 

Height, - . . . 

Breadth of each Aisle, 

Extreme breadth of nave and its aisles, 
Choir. — Length, - - - - 

Breadth, - - . . 

Height, - - . # . 



203 

166 

'38 

102 

17 

72 

156 

31 

102 



110 THE ABBIOY-CIIURCH OF WESTMINSTER. 



THE DIMENSION'S OF IIEXRY VIl'S CHAPEL ARE — 

FEET. 

Exterior. — Length from cast to west, including the walls, - - 115 

Breadth, including the walls, - - - - 80 

Height of the Octagonal Towers, - - - 71 

Height to the apex of the roof, . _ _ 86 

Height to the top of Western Turrets, - - - 102 

Nave.— Length, - - - -- - - 104 

Breadth, - - - - - - 36 

Height, 61 

Breadth of each Aisle, - - - - - 17 

111 a fine vault, under Henry VII's Chapel, is the burying- 
place of the Royal family, erected by George II, but not now 
used. 

The cost of Henry YII's Chapel was originally about X200,- 
000 of the present money, but since then X 50,000 in addition 
have been expended in repairs. The roof is the most beautiful 
piece of work of its kind in the world, and is not excelled by 
any Saracenic or Moorish ornamentation known. 

No living being has ever computed the cost of the Abbey it- 
self, but the sum, altogether, since the foundations were built, 
must be very great. 

The "Lord Abbot of Westminster" was one of the most 
powerful barons in England, and sat in Parliament as a great 
spiritual peer. 

The Abbey Church, formerly arose a magnificent apex to a 
Royal palace, surrounded on all sides by its greater and lesser 
sanctuaries, (where no criminal could be arrested,) and its al- 
monries, where aprofusionof food was daily delivered to the poor, 
and raiment to the naked. It had its bell-towers, the principal one 
being 72 feet 6 inches square, with Avails 20 feet thick ; chapel, 
gate towers, boundary walls, and a train of other buildings, of 
which we can at the present day scarcely form an idea. 

In addition to all the land around it, extending from the 
Thames to Oxford Street, an^ from Vauxhall bridge to the 
Church of St. Mary-lc-Strand, in a demesne of three square 
miles, on what is now the most valuable part of London, the 



A WEALTHY SOCIETY. Ill 

Abbey of St. Peter's, Westminster, possessed bcsi(lcs,?«'rte/?/-serew 
toivns and villaf/es, seventeen hamlets, and two hundred and sixteen 
manors. Its officers fed liundreds of persons daily, and one of 
its priests, who was not an Abbot, entertained at liis Pavillion 
at Tothill, a King and Queen of England, with so large a reti- 
nue that seven hundred dishes did not suffice for the first table, 
and the Abbey butler, in the reign of Edward III, rebuilt, at 
his own expense, the stately gatehouse which gave entrance to 
Tothill Street, and a portion of the wall remains to this day. 

During the long ages, while men of noble Norman birth 
monopolized nearly every office of emolument and trust in the 
kingdom, nearly all the Lord Abbots of Westminster were of 
Norman birth or extraction. To be chosen Lord Abbot of 
Westminster, it was necessary for the Monks, headed by the 
prior, to select the Abbot "per Yiam Compromissi," that is, 
the Monks met in a body and selected a chosen few, who, in 
their turn, selected the Lord Abbot. Then there was the 
method "perViam Spiritus Sancti," which means by the 
special influence of the Holy Ghost, or all the Monks of the 
Abbey concurring unanimously in the election. After that 
the assent of the King had to be got, and the assent of the 
Lord Bishop of the Diocese, and even then all was not secure, 
for the newly elected Abbot was often forced to make the long 
and tedious journey to Rome and get the investiture of the 
Abbey from the Pontiff, in person, and sometimes this cost 
money, and trouble, that a person would hardly credit in these 
days. Abbot Richard de Kedyington, who had been prior of 
Sudbury, a cell subject to Westminster Abbey, on his election 
made the journey to Arignon, where the Pope was, for confirm- 
ation, an I was three years there before he obtained investiture, 
and then it cost him eight thousand florins, — a large sum of 
money in those days — to obtain it. In 1321, when 5,600 florins 
had been paid, Pope John XXII remitted the remaining 2,500 
florins of the debt. 

Abljot Richard de Crokesley, together with a number of other 
nobles, and Poitevins, who had incurred the enmity of a pow- 
erful party who were opposed to court favoritism, were poisoned 



112 Tilt: ABBKY-CIIUUCH OF WESTMINSTER. 

l»y the steward of William, Earl of Clare, and Crokeslcy died 
July 1258, of the effects of the poison. 

Phillip do Lewisham, who was elected to succeed Crokesley, 
was so ji-ross and fat that he procured a dispensation, so that 
he would not have to go to Rome to be confirmed. An able 
deputation of monks went in his place, and when they returned 
Avith the Pojio's confirmation, after having to pay 800 marks to 
certain Cardinals, who opposed it, they found that Abbot de 
Lewisham had died during their absence. 

Gislebcrtus Crispinus, a monk, of the abbey of Bee, in Nor- 
mandy, and belonging to one of the noblest families in that 
duchy, was chosen abbot in 1082. He was a very learned man, 
and held a great disputation at Mentz, in Germany, with a 
deeply versed Jew, on the " Faith of the Church against the 
Jews." 

Gervase de Blois, an illegitimate son of King Stephen, was 
made abljot in 1141. This man was not fit to be a priest, 
being insolent, arbitrary, and unjust, and, instead of attending 
to his duties as head of the abbey, he was often in armor, dep- 
redating, or hunting, or hawking. He dissipated the manors, 
livings, tithes, vestments, and ornaments of the abbey, and was 
finally admonished to behave himself by Pope Innocent, but 
the abbot disregarded the admonition of the Pope and was then 
deposed by King Henry II, in 1159. He died in a year after. 

The Lord Abbot Laurentius, his successor, was a wise, just, 
and prudent man, much trusted by King Henry II, and the 
Empress Maud. It was Abbot Laurentius who first obtained 
for himself and successors the privilege of wearing the mitre, 
ring, and gloves, until then the symbols of Episcopacy, and 
only allowed to the Bishops by tlie Pope. The wearing of these 
symbols gave the mitred abbots of Westminster, and other 
abbeys, the right to sit as peers in parliament, the same as 
bishops to whom the right belonged exclusively, before Ab- 
bot Laurentius ol)tained the grant. 

Simon Langham was one of the greatest abbots that ever 
wore the mitre in the abl)ey. He was made Lord Chancellor 
of England, anjl Archbishop of Canterbury, Bishop of Ely, and 



REVENUES OF ABBEY IN 1540. 113 

Lord Treasurer of the Kingdom by Edward III. It Avas this 
prelate who deprived John Wickliffe of the mastership of Can- 
terbury Hall, Oxford, which was the first cause of Wickliffe's 
investigating the scriptures. 

On the 16th of January, 1540, the Abbey of Westminster, 
which had been established for more 'than nine hundred years, 
having been founded by King Sebert, a Saxon monarch, 
and his wife Ethelgoda, in honor of St. Peter who was said to 
have appeared to the King in a dream, was dissolved by order 
of Henry YIII, and the abbey was surrendered to the King by 
Abbot Benson and twenty-four monks. The annual revenue, 
which included the gross receipts, amounted to <£ 3,977, equal 
to twenty times the same amount of English money of to-day. 

Westminster was made a bishopric, the abbey was advanced 
to the dignity of a Cathedral, with an establishment of a 
bishop, (Thomas Tliirlcl)y, dean of the King's Chapel,) a 
dean, twelve prebendaries, and inferior officers. Abbot Ben- 
son, who was always oh the winning side, was made dean 
of the Abbey, five of the monks were chosen prebendaries, 
four other monks were made minor canons, and four more 
were elected to be King's students in the University. The 
other twelve monks who did not approve of the change were 
dismissed, with peiLsions of from ten pounds a year to five 
marks. A revenue of <£586 a year, and the Abbot's house 
was allotted to the Bishop. Dean Benson died in an un- 
happy state from the repeated attempts made liy tlie rapa- 
cious nobles and courtiers to deprive him of the lands of his 
deanery. He was buried in the abbey, but the inscription on 
his tomb was obliterated. The bishopric of Westminster lasted 
only ten years, and was then suppressed and reunited to that 
of London, to which it has since belonged. Numerous attempts 
were made by the partisans of the See of London to rob and 
deprive the abbey of its lands and revenues, and hence arose 
the saying of "robbing Peter to pay Paul," which is explained 
by the fact that the patron saint of the See of London was St. 
Paul, while St. Peter was the guardian of the Abbey of West- 
mmster. 



114 Tii:': ai5b::y-ciiu;{Cii of Westminster. 

In looG, Queen Mnvy heing on the throne, the Clmrch of 
AVcstminstei- again became an abl)ey by order of the Queen, 
and Jolui Feckenham Avas made abbot of Westminster. He 
was held in general esteem for his learning, charity, and piety, 
and he was continually engaged in doing good offices for the 
Protestants who suffered by the laws of the realm fur their 
faith. Three years after, ^Mary having died, the monastery 
was again suppressed by order of Queen Elizabeth, and the 
abbot and monks were again turned out of the abbey. In 1560 
the abbey, by enactment, was made a collegiate church, which 
it remains to this day, and was endowed with the lands which 
had belonged to the abbot and monastery. Since that time 
Westminster Abbey has been governed by a dean and chapter, 
and has had thirty-three deans in regular succession of the 
Protestant faith. 

Tlie Abbey has the following large clerical staff for its gov- 
ernment : 

One Dean, eight Prebendaries, one of whom is a Lord, and' 
another a Bishop; a sub-Dean, an Archdeacon, a Precentor, five 
minor Canons, eleven Lay Clerks, two Sacrists, a Dean's Ver- 
ger, a Prebendary's A''erger, a High Steward, who is a Duke, a 
Deputy High Steward, a Coroner, a High Bailiff, Searcher and 
Bailiff of the Sanctuary, a High Constable, a Head ]\Iaster of 
Westminster School, Second Master, forty Queen's Scholars on 
the Foundation, a Steward of the Manorial Court, two Joint 
Receiver's General, a Chapter Clerk and Registrar, an Auditor, 
a Commissory and OflTicial Principal, a Registrar of the Con- 
sistory Court, and a Dejjuty Registrar, an Organist and Master 
of the Choristers, twelve Almsmen, four Bell-ringers, two Organ- 
blowers, an Aljbey Surveyor, a Clerk of the Works, a Beadle 
of the Sanctuary, and last of all a College Porter and four Pro- 
bationary Choristers, in all a staff of eighty persons, a very slight 
reduction upon the old administration of the Abbots of West- 
minster. These different office holders, in all, receive salaries 
of about one Imndred tl\ousand pounds a year, and the cost of 
the school, and the repairs of the abbey, make the sundries 
amount to about twenty thousand pounds a year additional. 



I 



TOxMB OF SHAKESPEARE. 



115 



In the general plunder of monasteries and church property, 
which distinguished the reign of Henry YIII, Westminster 
Abbey suffered severely, but it was still worse treated by the 
Pm-itans in the great civil war, the abbey being used as a bar- 
rack for the soldiers, by the Parliament, who wantonly de- 
stroyed many of the tombs and monuments that adorned the 
various chapels, the altars in the chapels dedicated to the differ- 
ent saints being thrown down, the images broken, and the richly 
stained windows shattered into fragments. The restoration of 
the edifice was intrusted to Sir Christopher Wren, who built 
St. Paul's, but he made a very botching piece of work in the 
additions which he gave to 
the towers at the west end. 

The imitation of the Gothic 
style in Wren's additions are 
wretched and out of place in 
such an edifice as the Abbey. 
The front of the Abbey has no 
columns or pierced works of 
carving, to which the Gothic 
style owes so much of its 
lightness and elegance, and 
there is a mixture of orna- 
mentation such as the broken 
scrolls, masques, and festoons 
over the grand entrance, which 
gives it a very heavy, flat ap- 
pearance. 

The Abbey is very rich in 
monuments of all kinds, some 
of which are very fine works 
of art. All along the walls, 
in tlie transepts and aisles, in 
the Nave, in the chapels, in the flooring of the Abbey, and 
everywhere around me I saw tablets, tombs, inscriptions, and 
medallions. 

Among the most noticeable are those of Ben Johnson, John 
8 




SHAKESPEAKE S TOMB. 



116 THE ABBEY-CHURCH OF WESTMINSTER. 

Milton, Geoffrey Chaucer, the father of English poetry and 
first poet buried in the Abbey, A. D. 1400, Dryden, Thomas 
Campl)ell, William Shakespeare, Oliver Goldsmith, Joseph 
Addison, Handel the musician, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, Dr. 
Sannicl Johnson, Sir William Davenant, and Robert Southey, 
in the *• Poet's Corner," which is situated in the south tran- 
sept. They are all richly ornamented with busts, effigies of the 
deceased, or allegorical designs in marble, or brass, or bronze. 
The tomb of Shakespeare is of marble, with a full length 
figure of the great poet leaning on his left elbow, and has the 
following epitaph written by John Milton, who was best fitted 
to write it : 

What needs my Shakespeare for his honored bones, 

The labor of an age in piled stones, 

Or that his hallow'd relics should be hid 

Under a star-y pointing pjTamid ! 

Dear son of IMemory, great heir of fame, 

What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name, 

Thou in our wonder and astonishment 

Hast built thyself a live-long monument, 

For whilst to the shame of slow-endeavorino- art 

Thy easy numbers flow, and that each heart 

Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued book 

Those Delphic lines with deep impression took ; 

Then thou our fimcy of itself bereaving 

Dost make us marble with too much conceiving ; 

And so sepulchred, in such pomp dost lie, 

Tliat kings for such a tomb would wish to die. 

Milton's epitaph is as follows : 

" Three great poets, in three distant ages bom, 

Greece, Italy and England did adorn ; 

Tlie first in loftiness of thought surpass'd. 

The next in majesty— in both the last. 

The force of Nature could no farther go, 

To make the third, she joined the former two."— 

Jolin Gay, the author of the " Beggar's Opera," wrote his 
own epitaph, which is on his tomb ; 

" Life is a jest, and all things show it; 
I thought so once ; but now I know it." 



THE LAST CATHOLIC FUNERAL. 



ii: 



There is a sarcophagus to Major John Andre who was exe- 
cuted as a spy by order of George Washington. It has a rep- 
resentation of a flag of truce, and Britannia in tears. 

Mrs. Oldtield, the actress who coquetislily ordered tliat she 
should be buried in a fine Holland 
chemise, with a tucker, and a double 
ruffle of lace, and a pair of white kid 
gloves, has a monument with an in- 
scription by Pope. Isaac Newton has 
also a very fine monument, and Wil- 
liam Pitt's monument cost <£6,000. 
Henry Grattan, Robert Peel, Charles 
James Fox, William Wilberforce, 
George Canning, and Lord Palmer- 
ston also have monuments. 

Mary Queen of Scots, and the 
Queen who slew her, have magnifi- 
cent monuments near each other, 
and similar in style. The funeral of 
Queen Mary, sister of Queen Eliza- 
beth, was the last one which was cel- 
ebrated in theAbbey with the ceremo- 
nial of the Roman Catholic Church. 
She died in 1558, and her body was 
brought from St. James Palace with great pomp to the Abbey, 
on a splendid chariot. It was met at the great entrance of 
the abbey by four bishops and Lord Abbott Feckenham in mi- 
tre, robes, and with crozier. The body lay all night under 
the hearse, with a guard of nobles and pages to watch it. On 
the fourteenth day of December it was interred in the vault, 
and a plain black tablet was erected to be placed over it by 
King James I, with the inscription : 




TOMB OF 3IILTOX. 



ET MARIA SORORES 
IN SPES RESVRRECTIONIS. 



James II, who sought to re-establish the Roman Catholic Faith 
in England, (like Queen Mary,) died at St. Germain En-Laye, in 



118 



THE ACBEY-CHURCH OF "WESTMINSTER. 




France, and lias no tomb in the Abbey. His intestines were 
given to the Irish College, in Paris, the brains to the Scotch 
College, and the heart to the Convent of Chaillot. 

Admiral Kempenfcldt, who was drowned on the man-of-war 
Royal George, which smik with eight hundred men, all of 
whom were lost, off Spithead, in 1782, is also buried here, with 

the epitaph on his tomb, writ- 
ten by Cowper the poet : 



" Toll, toll, for the brave- 
Brave Kempenfeldt is gone ; 
His last sea-fight is fought; 
His work of glory done. 
His sword was in its sheath, 
His fingers held the pen, 
When Kempenfeldt went down, 
With twice four hundred men." — 

The Chapel of Edward the 
Confessor, who founded the 
Abbey, is full of dead Kings 

and Queens, so full that a poet has written of the commingled 

Royal dust that is here reposing : 

" Think how many royal bones, 
Sleep within these heaps of stones. 
Here they lie, had realms and lands, 
Who now want strength to lift their hands. 
Where, from their pulpit sealed with dust, 
They preach, ' In greatness is no trust 1' 
Here's an acre, sown indeed, 
W^ith the richest, royalest seed. 
That the earth did e'er suck in, 
Since the first man died for sin." 

Here lies buried Edward the Confessor, before whose tomb 
was kept continually burning a silver lamp. On one side 
stood an image of the Virgin, in silver, adorned with two jewels 
of immense value, presented by Eleanor, Queen to Henry HI ; 
on the other side stood an image of the Virgin, carved in ivory, 
l>resented l)y Thomas a-Bccket. Edward I offered the Scotch 



TOMB OF MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. 



INTERMENTS DURING THE MIDDLE AGES. ITU 

regalia and the antique stone on which the Kings of Scotland 
were crowned at Scone; this latter relic is still preserved. 
This slirine was composed of various colored stones, in Mosaic 
work; but it is so dilapidated that very little idea can be 
formed of its original beauty and grandeur. 

Queen Editha, Queen Maud, Edward I, Henry III, Elizabeth 
Tudor, daughter of Henry VII, Queen Eleanor, Henry V, the 
victor of Agincourt, Queen Phillippa, Edward IH — with his 
sword, seven feet long and weighing eighteen pounds, together 
with his enormous shield, hanging to his tomb, — Margaret of 
York, Richard II, and a host of others, are here buried. Their 
tombs are of magnificent workmanship, with full length figures 
lying recumbent and their hands clasped in prayer. 

The Abbots and Priors of the abbey are buried in the walks 
of the Cloisters, and I stood on three of these mural slabs, and 
looked at the worn, full length effigies of the dead abbots, in 
full abbatical robes, ring on finger, mitre on head, and crozier 
in hand, their Latinized names almost worn away by the foot- 
steps of the hundreds of thousands of men and women who had 
paced the Cloisters since they were interred, seven hundred 
years ago. And yet these tombs in Westminster Cloisters are 
but as yesterday, when compared with the Pyramids of Egypt, 
or a geological formation. 

It was in Westminster Abbey that all the Kings and Queens 
of England have been crowned, and when a monarch had been 
crowned previously, as in the case of Henry III, whose coro- 
nation took place at Gloucester, it was thought proper to have 
the ceremony again performed at Westminster, in the pres- 
ence of the nobles and the chief ecclesiastical dignitaries of tlje 
land ; the Archljishop of Canterbury always officiating in the 
august ceremonial. 

What wondrous scenes this proud old Abbey has witnessed ! 
I can but enumerate a few of these however. One day in the 
middle of Lent, 1176, the King and his son came to London, 
while a Convocation of the Clergy was being held in Westmins- 
ter Abbey. The Papal Legate was present, and the Archbish- 
ops of Canterbury and York were also present. Thomas a- 
Becket had been murdered by order of tlie reigning King 



120 THE ABBEY-CHURCH OF WESTMINSTER. 

Ilenry II. Beckct had been Archbishop of Canterbury. In 
the Convocation the then Archbishop of Canterbury, as Primate 
of the Kingdom, sat on the right hand of the Papal Legate. 
The Archbishop of York seeing this, when he entered the Ab- 
bey, came in a rude manner and pushing between the Primate 
and the Legate, as if disdaining to sit on the left hand of any- 
body, thinist himself into the lap of the Primate in a swash- 
buckling manner. The Primate would not move^ and no 
sooner had the insult been offered than the Bishops and Chap- 
lains in the Abbey ran to the dais and pulled my Lord of York 
down and threw him to the ground, and began to beat him 
severely. The Archbishop of Canterbury then sought to save 
him, and when he, the Archbishop of York, got on his feet, he 
straightway went to the King whom he had advised to murder 
Thomas a-Becket, and made complaint of the outrage which 
had been offered him. The King laughed at him for his pains. 
As he left the Abbey the monks, and priests, and bishops, with 
a loud shout cried out at him, " Go, traitor, thou didst betray 
the holy man Thomas a-Becket ; go get thee hence, thy hands 
yet stink of blood." 

Wlicn the news reached the Archbishop of York (previously) 
that the Archbishop of Canterbury (Becket) had been assas- 
sinated on the steps of the Altar, he ascended his pulpit and 
announced the fact to his congregation as an act of Divine ven- 
geance, saying that Becket had perished in his pride and guilt 
like Pharaoh. 

In 1297, Edward I offered at the shrine of Edward the Con- 
fessor, the famous stone, crown, and sceptre of the Scottish 
Sovereigns, together with the Coronation Chair, now in the 
Aljbey, on which all English monarchs have to sit to be crowned. 
This chair was taken from the Abbey of Scone, in Scotland, by 
Edward, having been brought to Scotland by King Fergus from 
Ireland, three centuries before the Christian Era. Before that 
period, it is said to liave been used for many hundred years by 
the Irish Kings for a like purpose. 

Tlie Scots were very eager to get the stone back for the rea- 
son that a legend existed that whoever possessed the stone 



CORONATION OF WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR. 



121 



should rule Scotland. This old stone chair, or rather oaken 
chair with a stone seat, — twenty-six inches in length, sixteen 
inches and three quarters in breadth, and ten and a half inches 
in thickness — has seen many 
strange changes in dynas- 
ties, for every king since Ed- 
ward I, has sat in it on his 
coronation day. 

The ceremonies of coron- 
ation were very grand in the 
olden time and much of their 
splendor has passed away or 
has become obsolete. 

One of the grandest sights 
ever witnessed in the Abbey 
was when Aldred, Archbish- 
op of York, crowned Wil- 
liam the Conqueror, King of 
England. The mail clad 
bodies of Norman soldiery 
lined every part of old Lon- 
don to keep down the Saxons, 
while William, superbly 
mounted, and followed by a 

train of two hundred and sixty barons, lords and knights, entered 
the Abbey. When the multitude reached the high altar, Geof- 
frey, Bishop of Coutances, asked the Normans if they were 
willing to have the Duke crowned King of England, and the 
nobles, knights, and priests, among whom the English lordships 
and abljeys were already parceled out, cried aloud with one 
voice that they were. The Norman horsemen without the 
walls of the al^bey hearing the shout, fancied that the Saxons 
within had attacked their countrymen, and immediately they set 
fire to the houses around the abbey, and in a few minutes the 
abbey was deserted of friend and foe alike with tlie exception 
of William and a few priests who stood firm, although the Duke 
trembled violently as the crown was placed upon his head. He 




CORONATION CHAIR. 



122 tiif: abbey church op Westminster. 

declared tliat he would treat the English people as well as the 
best of their kings had done, vowing by the Splendor of God, 
his usual oath. 

The coronation of Richard I, the Lion Heart as he was 
called, was attended with great pomp. 

On the third of September, 1189, the Archbishops of Can- 
terbury, Rouen, Treves in Germany, and Dublin, arrayed in 
silken copes, and preceded by a body of clergy bearing the 
cross, lioly water, censers and tapers, met Richard at the door 
of his privy chamber in "Westminster Palace, and proceeded 
with him to the Abbey. In the midst of a numerous body of 
bisliops and ecclesiastics, marched four barons, each with a 
golden candlestick and taper, then in succession — Geoffrey de 
Lacey with the royal cap, John the Marslial with the royal spurs 
of gold, and William, Earl of Striguil and Pembroke, with the 
golden Rod and Dove. Then came David, brother to the King 
of Scotland, and present as Earl of Huntington, and Robert, 
Earl of Leicester, supporting John the King's brother, the 
three bearing upright swords in richly gilded scabbards. 

Following tliem came six barons bearing a chequered table, 
upon which Avere the King's robes and regalia, and now was 
seen approaching the central object of this gorgeous picture — 
Richard himself, under a gorgeous canopy stretched by six 
lances, borne by as many nobles, having immediately before 
liim the Earl of Albemarle with the crown, and a bishop on 
each side. The ground on which he walked was spread with 
rich cloths of Tyrian dye. 

At the foot of the altar, Baldwin, Archbishop of Canterbury, 
admmistercd the oath, by Avhich Richard undertook to bear 
peace, honor, and reverence to God and Holy Church, to exer- 
crcise riglit, justice, and law, and to abrogate all wicked laws 
and customs. He tlien put off all his garments from the mid- 
dle upwards, like a modern prize fighter, except liis shirt, 
which was opgn at the sliouldcrs, and he was annointed on the 
liead, breast, and arms, with oil, signifying glory, fortitude, and 
wisdom. He then covered his head with a fine linen cloth and 
set the cap thereon, placed the surcoat of velvet and dalmatica 



THE MASSACRE. 123 

over his shoulders, and took the sword of tlic Kingdom from the 
Ai'chbishop to subdue the enemies of the Catliolic Church, and 
then put on the golden sandals and the royal mantle, which 
last was splendidly embroidered, and was led to the altar, where 
the Arclibishop charged him on God's behalf, not to presume to 
take this dignity upon him unless he were resolved to keep in- 
violably the vows he had made ; to which the king replied : 

" By God, His grace, I will faithfully keep them all : Amen." 
The crown was then handed to the Archbishop, by Richard 
himself, in token that he held it only from God, when the 
Archbishop placed it on the King's head ; he also gave the 
sceptre into his right hand, and the royal rod into his left. 

At the close of this part of the ceremony Richard was led 
back to the throne, and High Mass being performed with grand 
pomp, Richard offered as was usual, a mark of pure gold to 
the altar. 

While the coronation was going on inside massacre and arson 
reigned outside of the Abbey. Before the ceremony, Richard, 
by proclamation had forbidden all Jews to be present at West- 
minster, either within or without the Abbey, but some members 
of that persecuted race had rashly ventured mthin the walls, 
and a hue and cry being set up at what was deemed a sacri- 
lege, the populace ejected a prominent Israelite and beat him 
with sticks and stones. In a few minutes a report spread that 
the King had ordered the destruction of the Jews, and the 
furious mob spread all over the city, burning the houses and 
destroying the lives of the miserable Jews. Men, women, and 
children of tender age were burned alive in their domiciles, 
where resistance was made to the mob, and the cries of the 
murdered children blended discordantly witli the sounds of the 
shaums, and jongleurs, and the shouts of the rabble, who were 
celebrating the coronation. The riot became so formidable that 
at last Richard, who was at dinner in Westminster Hall, ordered 
the Chief Justiciary of the Kingdom, Ranulf de Glanville, to 
go and quell it, but this was more easy to order than to per- 
form, and the King's officers were driven back to the Hall. 

Through all that night and day the pillage, arson, and mas- 



124 THE ABBEY-CHURCH OP WESTMINSTER. 

sacre continued, and the next day the King hanged three of 
the ra])l)le as an atonement. 

At the coronation of Henry IV, Sir John Dymoke, the 
Champion of England, rode into the Hall of Westminster 
Palace, where dinner was being served to the King, on horse- 
back in complete armor, with a knight before him bearing his 
spear, and his sword and dagger by his side, and presented a 
label to the king on which had been written a challenge to any 
knight, squire, or gentleman, who dared declare that Henry 
was not rightful King of England. He then had a trumpet 
blown, and cried out that he was ready to fight in the quarrel. 
The label was then taken and cried by the heralds in six places 
in the town of Westminster, but no person seemed ready to 
fight although Richard H had been deposed by Henry IV and 
was then in a neighboring dungeon. 

That most atrocious medieval fraud, Richard III, when about 
to be crowned King, walked barefoot from Westminster Hall 
to the Abbey, a distance of about six hundred feet, to let the 
crowds witness his resignation and humility. 

When Edward VI, a boy of sixteen, was about to be crowned, 
he laid himself down upon the steps of the altar on his stomach 
while Cranmer, Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, opened his 
shirt and rubbing the oil between his shoulder blades, anointed 
him. 

James I, who hated tobacco and witches, forbade the people 
to come to Westminster to witness his Coronation, as the plague 
was then raging, and James did not wish to catch the distem- 
per. 

Charles I was crowned February 2, 1626, and his Queen, Hen- 
rietta, being a Catholic, was not a sharer in the Coronation, 
nor was she a spectator, and she would not accept the place fitted 
up for her in the Abbey, but stood at the window of the Palace 
gates to look at the crowd and procession, while her retinue of 
French ladies, nobles and servants, were dancing within. When 
Charles walked up to the altar to ascend the throne. Laud, who 
was Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Duke of Buckingliam, 
Lord High Constable of England, offered him their hands on 



I 



OxMEN OF ILL LUCK. 125 

either side to ascend the throne, but the King smilingly re- 
fused their hands and said : 

" I have as much need to help you, as you have to assist me." 

Then Laud presented the King to the great crowd of Nobles 
and people, and said, in an audible voice, " My masters and 
friends, I am here come to present unto you your King : King 
Charles, to whom the crown of liis ancestors and predecessors 
is now devolved by lineal right ; and therefore I desire you by 
your general acclamation, to testify your consent and willing- 
ness thereunto." 

Not a voice answered, and there was a stillness as of the 
grave through the vast spaces of the Abbey. It was a bad 
omen of a reign, which ended so disastrously, for the listening 
monarch. 

At last the Earl-Marshal, Lord Arundel and Howard, said 
to the spectators present : " Good people, I pray thee, why call 
ye not right lustily, ' God save King Charles?' " 

Thus admonished, they with one voice exclaimed, " God save 
Charles, our King." In the adjoining hall, Oliver Cromwell 
was inaugurated Lord Protector of England, with a quiet cere- 
monial, attended by ushers, life guards. State coaches, the Long 
Parliament, and several troops of horse. 

When James 11 was crowned, the*Royal bauble tottered on 
his head, and this was supposed to be a prophetic omen of ill 
luck. 

When George III was made King, with great pomp and cir- 
cumstance, there was present, unknown to the crowd, a young 
man who must have witnessed the placing of the Golden Cir- 
clet on the brow of this fat, Hanoverian Prince, with strange 
emotions. He could have said with truth, "My place should 
have been by that chair ; my father should have been sitting 
in it," for it was the young Pretender, Charles Stuart; the last 
of his royal and unfortunate race. 

At all the late Coronations, the magnificent pomp and cere- 
monial of the Middle Ages have been omitted, and the last 
time that these Ceremonies were carried out was at the Coro- 
nation of George IV, when the Celebration was a very fine one. 



126 THE ABBEY-CUURCH OP WESTMINSTER. 

The wood-work of the Choir was removed and boxes erected, 
afTording an uninterrupted view of the Nave and Chancel, show- 
ing the Peers and Peeresses in all their magnificence of robes, 
of satins and silks, and head-dresses of feathers and diamonds. 
To these were added tlie brilliantly illuminated surcoats of the 
Heralds and Kings-at-arms, while the King himself sat in the 
royal Chair of State, which is over two thousand years old, and 
there received homage from the great officers of State, and 
Peers of the Realm, the Crown on his head and Sceptre in his 
hand, the Garter and George around his neck, and the velvet 
robes enfolding his body, which was then scorbutic from dis- 
ease and dissipation. 

The challenge of the Champion of England was at this cere- 
mony delivered for the last time. After the banquet was over, 
at which seventeen thousand pounds of meat, three thousand 
fowls, one thousand dozen of wine, ten thousand plates, and 
seventeen thousand knives and forks, were among the items, 
came the challenge to all who dared to dispute the right of 
George to the throne of England. 

It was an imposing sight, as the Duke of Wellington, with 
his Ducal Coronet ornamented with strawberry leaves, on his 
head, and in his flowing Peer's robes walked down the hall, 
cheered by the officers o^ the Life Guards, who were present. 
He shortly afterwards returned, mounted, and accompanied by 
the Marquis of Anglesey, the one-legged cavalry officer of Wa- 
terloo, and Howard, Duke of Norfolk, the Hereditary Earl 
Marshal of England. 

The three Nobles rode gracefully to the foot of the throne, 
paid their homage, and then backed their horses down the 
lofty hall. Tlie hall doors of the Palace opened again, and 
outside, in the twiliglit, a man in complete armor of Milan 
proof, appeared on horseback, outlined against the shining sky. 
He then moved, passed into darkness, and under the mass- 
ive arch, and suddenly Howard, Wellington, and Anglesey, 
stood in full view of tlie vast assemblage, with the palace 
doors closed behind tlicm. This was the finest sight of 
the day, as the Herald read the challenge, a glove was thrown 



THE RANQUET AND CHALLENGE. 



127 



down by a gauntleted hand as a token of defiance, which was 
taken up instantly by Wellington, and then they all proceeded 
to the throne, trumpets blowing, people shouting, and flower- 
girls strewing the way with baskets of flowers. 

The funerals of Lady Palmerston and George Peabody were 
the last that have taken place in Westminster Abbey, and at 
the funeral of the former a London reporter, in his eagerness 
to get an item, fell into the grave of Lady Palmerston and 
nearly frightened a young lady mourner out of her senses. 
Such is the story of this Mausoleum of Royalty and Heroism. 
Westminster Abbey is only equaled for the antiquity and grand- 
eur of its mortal remains by the Abbey of St. Denis, in France, 
and those world-old cemeteries, the Pyramids of Egypt. 




CHAPTER IX. 

THE COSTERMONGERS AND RAG FAIR. 




HERE is a wide, short street, or rather road, 
in the heart of London. The buildings are 
mean, the people who cluster again their 
doorways and in the alleys and courts that 
branch from this short, wide street, are 
wretched in appearance ; their garments are 
patched and in piecemeal, and when untorn they are greasy and 
besmeared with filth. 

In this street, crowded at night — on Saturday night it is 
almost impassable — children of a tender age may be seen beg- 
ging for coppers and soliciting assistance from those of more 
mature years, but to the full as wretched as themselves. Vice 
is in every glance of their eyes. Crime has already made its 
graven lines in their young faces, and their language or dialect, 
(for it is not a language), is a combination of uncouth sounds, 
obscene imagery, and slang corruptions of the English tongue. 
This street, or road, is called the "New Cut," and is situated 
in Lambeth on the Surrey side of the Thames. It is reached 
from the City by Waterloo Bridge and the Waterloo road, and 
from the West End by Lambeth and Vauxhall bridges. Thou- 
sands are born, baptized, many beget children and die within 
the municipality of the Great Metropolis, and yet have never 
seen the New Cut — nay, have never even heard of it, or if they 
did, the word would have as much meaning to them as the 
plains of El Ghizeh, or the source of the Nile to a Bow Cock- 
ney. Yet there arc thousands who are born here in this New 



ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY'S GARDENS. 129 

Cut who live and die in it and make a living for themselves, 
after a fashion, who, if not content with, are certainly unaware 
of any method of changing or bettering their lot in this life. 

Narrow, dark, and mean streets run contiguous to the New 
Cut, and branch from it in a winding, snaky way. A decently- 
dressed man is not safe in this street, and the only sound of 
civilization to cheer him, once lost in the mazes of these fester- 
ing lanes and alleys, teeming with low pot-houses, tai>rooms, 
and wild-looking children, bold, bad-looking desperadoes of 
men, and reckless, obscene women, is the low, rumbling sound 
coming like the approaching thunder to his ears every few 
minutes as the loaded passenger trains dash to and fro on the 
Northwestern and Southeastern Railways. 

The New Cut runs into the Lower Marsh and is flanked by 
Wooton, White Horse, Collingwood, Eaton, Marlboro streets, 
and the Broad Wall. To the west are Thomas, Isabella, and 
Granby streets, and from all this misery and destitution of a 
quarter where the inhabitants are packed like rabbits in a well- 
stocked warren, the road leads through the Upper Marsh down 
to the rare pleasaunce or garden of the palace of the Arch- 
bishop of Canterbury, one of the most sumptous ecclesiastical 
retreats in England. The Archbishop's gardens, although lo- 
cated in the heart of a populous city, cover as much ground, it 
is calculated, as gives sleeping and eating room to 11,000 hu- 
man beings in the New Cut district. 

It is true that the river rolls sluggishly five or six hundred 
yards below the New Cut, and those who are tired of dog's 
meat, rotten vegetables, and the offal of the street markets for 
their common food, and of sleeping eight in a room on straw 
which is not even clean, can at any time deliver their bodies from 
further pain and starvation, and their minds from a daily never- 
ending struggle as to how the dog's meat and decayed offal 
may be procured, by a quick plunge in the river, near by. 

This quarter is the principal resort of the " costermongers " 
of London. The word " costermonger " has an equivalent 
which is better known as '• peddler." All those who vend or 
hawk vegetables, fruit, carrion meat, game, fowl, ginger beer, 



130 THE COSTERMONGERS AND RAG FAIR. 

nuts, or, ill fact, any of tlic numerous articles or commodities 
of refuse merchandise found on tlie barrows and wagons of the 
London jieddlers, arc called by the London term " costermon- 
gers." The word is an old one used by Shakespeare, and 
therefore has, if none other, the merit of antiquity of the most 
genuine kind. 

There are in London proper, embracing its suburbs, of both 
sexes — including men, women, and children — according to in- 
formation which I had procured from the police and physi- 
cians, who have means of knowing, about 23,000 costermon- 
gers. These people are from daybreak until midnight in the 
open air, I might say, for their marketing is done as early as 
four or five o'clock in the morning; and then, after an hour or 
so spent in marketing, comes the cheap, scanty breakfast, con- 
sisting of a pound of bread, a " saveloy," which is a sort of a 
sausage, at a penny a piece, about four inches long and two 
inches in circumference, quite succulent to the costermonger's 
palate, or perhaps a piece of beef or bacon of the kind that is 
vended from barrows in the London streets at two pence a 
pound, the refuse of the butchers' shops and pieces unfit for a 
ready sale. 

Among these refuse pieces are small portions of ham, shoul- 
ders, and pork, fragments of bacon, "snag" pieces, and mut- 
ton, and a very suspicious veal, which is often sold by these 
same hawkers in the suburbs to old maids for cats' meat. 
Sometimes the " coster" will take a pint of sloppy coffee, which 
he gets for three half-pence, with his brief breakfast; at other 
times he prefers a quartern of gin " neat," at two-pence ; and 
again he will be satisfied with a mug of beer at two-pence. As 
early as 7 o'clock in the morning the hideous noises, which can 
only come from the throat of a costermonger, are heard in the 
London streets, awakening those who wish to sleep late, and, to 
make matters worse, no person, unless the costermonger him- 
self, can by any application ever understand the exact words 
of their cries. They are only to be recognized by sound, and, 
therefore, it is always necessary to appear at a window or door- 
way in order to discover the precise article which the coster 
wishes you to buy. 



SALE OF WATER CRESSES. 131 

I 

I visited the New Cut on a Saturday night, which is the 
great market night, when traffic is at its height in the neigh- 
borhood. The wide, short street, wliich runs into a half circle 
at its end, was filled Avith people. The noise was of that in- 
definite kind which is hardly to be described. Stands, barrows, 
and wagons, having ponies and asses attached, were placed 
along the gutters, with smoky lamps fed with a disagreeable 
smelling oil, from which a dusky flame was shed over the street, 
showing the faces of the venders as they gave tongue to many 
different cries. 

" Whelks," a small shell-fish, like the American mussel, 
were heaped in thousands on the heads of barrels and tables, 
and ham sandwiches, at a penny apiece, and boiled potatoes, 
witli sheeps' trotters, oysters, fried fish, oranges, apples, plums, 
and, in fact, every kind of fruit and vegetable were for sale. 
Little ragged boys and girls, their feet bare and dirty, ran hither 
and thither, importuning the passers-by to purchase their 
matches and water-cresses. Here water-cresses and radishes 
are sold together in bunches at a penny a handful. Some of 
these small children are up as early as five o'clock in the morn- 
ing, to purchase the water-cresses at Farringdon market, and 
from that time until midnight, or until the theatres close, they 
are crying their water-cresses, which they carry with them 
through the London streets in a basket. 

The whelks are sold at two a penny, and are accounted a 
delicacy by the poor of London, when properly seasoned with 
pepper, salt, and vinegar. They are very much relished in the 
pot-houses of the metropolis by hard drinkers when pickled in 
this fashion, and in any tai>room of a Saturday night it is not 
uncommon to find men or women peddling these shell-fish to 
those who have been drinking freely. The costermongers are 
universally great gamblers, and earning during the week from 
twelve to thirty shillings, as their luck may run with the pur- 
chasing community, yet it is not an uncommon occurrence for 
them to gamble away as much as fifty per cent, of their week's 
earnings in various games of chance. 

These people have no religious belief whatever, and do not 
9 



132 THE COSTERMONGERS AND RAG FAIR. 

know anything even of the rudiments of religious instruction. 
To them God is some indefinite being whose attributes are un- 
known, and whose immutable laws are disregarded simply from 
utter ignorance. They never darken a church door, and tracts 
arc received by them with the most supreme disgust. 

A number of missionaries have labored among them in vain 
for any great result, chiefly dissenting clergymen, and, although 
they will listen to them patiently enough, yet they look upon 
them as the representatives of wealth and intelligence, and 
tliey cannot tell the difference between a Wesleyan minister 
Avho holds forth on a Sunday morning, with a big banner, call- 
ing upon them to repent, in the dark alleys of Bethnal Green 
and Whitechapel, and the richly beneficed divine of the Church 
of England who rolls by in a carriage, totally heedless of their 
condition, bodily or spiritual. All men who wear white neck- 
cloths are called parsons, and are disliked by the " costers." 
Besides, they have not learned to read, and tracts are useless 
to them, were they willing to study tlieir contents. 

The marriage relation is utterly ignored among them, and, 
if what the police to'd me be true, not ten per cent, of the cos- 
termongers who live with women and vend their goods in com- 
mon are married. At fifteen years of age the young coster- 
monger leaves father and mother to cleave to a girl of his own 
age, also the child of a costermonger, bred in the gutters of 
the metropolis, and, having purchased a barrow for ten shillings, 
and an ass for perhaps X2, the pair begin the world practically 
man and wife, but without ever dreaming of calling in the as- 
sistance of the minister to bind them together in the bonds of 
lawful wedlock. 

A marriage certificate in a costermonger's den would, in- 
deed, be a curious and unusual relic, as would also the mar- 
riage ring, which is looked upon in civilized society as the 
seal and confirmation of the wedding ceremony. They say 
that they cannot afford to pay a minister's fee, and as their 
code of morals is beneath mention they do not see the neces- 
sity of the expenditure. Their children grow up in the same 
way, bred, as their parents have been, to hawk and cry from 



HEATHENISM OP THE COSTERS. 133 

dawn until darkness, and thus the costermongers increase, more 
savage in their usages than the American aborigines. 

Mind, I am now speaking of the English costermongers, for, 
with the Irish costermongers, both male and female, who are 
still lower in the social scale as far as the goods of this world 
go, it is different. While the English coster cares not for the 
visits of the minister of the Protestant faith, the Catholic 
priest is ever welcome among his wretched and degraded flock 
in Whitechapel, in the New Cut, in St. Giles, or Lambeth, and 
he is beloved by them in their own rude, reckless way. The 
Irish costermonger believes most firmly in the sanctity of the 
marriage ceremony. With a few exceptions, their children, 
however wretched and miserable their lot may be in the future 
life, are born in wedlock, and the slur of illegitimacy cannot 
be thrown up at them. They will always have a few coppers 
to give their priests to help those more miserable than them- 
selves, and, though these children but rarely receive the bene- 
fits of a common English schooling, they are more eager to 
learn and more ready to seek instruction than the children of 
their English neighbors. 

I inquired of one of these costermongers, who had a fricd- 
fish stand in the New Cut, and sold sprats all cooked and ready 
for eating, if he could read. He seemed rather an intelligent 
fellow, in his way, and had by no means the uncouth, ruflfianly 
look that I noticed in many of the men's faces who were engaged 
in selling vegetables, fish, whelks, and periwinkles in the street. 
He had a little smoky lamp depending from a sort of gallows 
over his cart, and he spoke cheerfully : 

" Well, I'm not much of a reader, like you gentlefolks be ; 
but I picked up a little book schoolin' at the Ragged schools 
by night, when I had four puns saved, last winter. The letters 
wor a cruel bother to me at first, and I most guv it hup at the 
beginning, sort o' faint-hearted ; but the teacher, as wos a ]\Iiss 
Spencer, she wos a good gal, and she says to me (about Christ- 
mas it wor), ' Jimmy, you'll never learn to read hif you don't 
persewere, and I know, Jimmy, you can persewere hif you 
want to.' Ye see, sir, I had just gived the blessed book a kick 



134 THE C0STERM0NGER3 AND RAG FAIR. 

into a corner of the room, like mad ; cos vy, the blessed letters 
■wor so cranky and they wor all so mixed hup together tliat I 
lost my 'ead as it wor, and I couldn't make nothink hout of 
their shapes. But that gal. Miss Spencer, she wor a topper 
and no mistake. She guv me a kind of a smile, and bless me 
hif she didn't go to the corner of the room and she takes hup 
the book as I had flung down, with 'er pretty little fingers, and 
vith tliat she puts hit into my 'and, hand then I 'adn't the 'art 
to refuse the gal ; and that wos the way as I larned to read ; 
and now I reads Reynold's Weekly hevery Sunday mornin' to 
my maty, the boiled potato man, which is 'ere to speak for 
issclf, sir." 

The boiled potato man was advanced in years — a hardy, rug- 
ged-looking fellow, who seemed as if he would like to read like 
his " maty," but could not muster up courage to begin so late 
in life. I mentioned casually to him that a great Latin gram- 
marian had, at an early stage of the world's history, made the 
attempt to learn Greek, being then seventy years of age. His 
characteristic reply made me see that my remark had struck 
him in the wrong place. 

" Well," said he, "hif that blessed hold Latting, as ye calls 
'im, had to 'awk biled pertatcrs from mornin' till night in the 
New Cut, and go 'orae to three kids vith, maybe, honly seven- 
pence for 'is day's vork, I'm blessed hif 'ee'd a-bother'd 'is 
precious hold soul a-lcarnin' Greek, or hany other lingo. I 
finds lienufF to do vith the mealys, vithout a-troublin' myself 
hal)out the books as I see hevcrywhere I goes. N-i-c-e 'ot per- 
taties — hall smokin' 'ot — a-penny apiece !" 

I bought a hot potato and a sprat, and left the two wonder- 
ing if I had been "gafiing " or " larkin' " on 'em ; and passing 
through the crowded street, past butchers standing at their 
doors in dirty aprons, sharpening their knives in a business like 
manner ; past water-cress and match girls, who seemed to 
spring out of the gutters, so thick were they ; past drunken, 
noisy women, staggering home to their miasmatic dens, with 
bunches of vegetables or chunks of meat in their arms, wrap- 
ped in coarse brown papers, dirty children following their foot- 



THE NEW CUT. 137 

steps, gaunt and shadowy-like ; past reeking, greasy coffee-shops, 
the very sign-boards of which were redolent of eel pics, kidney 
stews, and all the abominations which are devoured in this 
neighborhood daily and nightly, by the poor people Avho are 
fcrced to eat this food, the refuse of the slaughter-houses of 
mighty, populous London, from that stern, blind necessity which 
knows no law, and I came upon a crowd of the working peo- 
ple — costermongers, peddlers, match-women, and young lads 
and girls — who find habitations in the dusky lanes and fright- 
ful courts of the neighborhood. I stood before a large, dark- 
looking building, which seemed like a prison, its frowning, dirty 
facade being no evidence that it was a place of amusement. 
But it was a place of amusement, or, rather, a place of torture. 
This was the " Royal Victoria Theatre," New Cut, Lambeth. 

The Victoria Theatre, or the " Vick," as it is called by its 
patrons, is one of the most democratic places of amusement, if 
not the most democratic in London. In another place I will 
attempt to describe the strange sights which I saw inside of its 
walls, but at present I shall confine myself to giving my readers 
a view of the '• Old Clothes " district, which is chiefly inhabited 
by the lower class of the London Jew peddlers or hawkers. 

Dick Ralph was a patrolman bold, who did duty in tlie " H," 
or Smithfield Division of the City of London police, and was 
rewarded for his vigilance and attention to duty by being pro- 
moted to the office of " special," under probation, in the old 
Jewry squad of detectives. 

Dick had lately married and was the proprietor of a fine 
chubby boy of fifteen months old, who resembled his father in 
every respect, having the same red flush in the cheeks, the 
same black eyes, which sparkled like diamonds, and the same 
little chubby nose. The family lived back of St. Paul's tow- 
ering pile, in a little lane or court which ran around the old 
sheds that formed a part of the Old Market or Newgate sham- 
bles, and was the principal fresh meat mart before the New 
Smithfield Market had been built. 

Ralph had been detailed by Inspector Bailey to visit Petti- 
coat lane, Houndsditch, Bcvis Marks, and the Minories with 



138 THE COSTERMONGERS AND RAG FAIR. 

me, and we were to go together to the Sunday market in this 
district, which is almost entirely inhabited by Jews, although 
a greater i>art of the out-door trade and costermongering is 
done by Christian Cockneys. 

I found Ralph living up a two-pair back, in one of the 
queerest, old-fashioned wooden houses in the Newgate shambles. 
Directly over my head was the dome of St. Paul's, with the 
morning fog clearing away from its peak, and the sun was 
gradually appearing to gild the tall cross on the apex, and tlie 
tower of St. Faith's, under St. Paul's. The stairs were rick- 
etty and dark, and the wainscotting quite fanciful. A woman 
of twenty-five or six years of age, rather tidy in appearance, I 
saw holding the big chubby baby, the pride of the Ralph family. 
The family were at breakfast, and had l)cen busy discussing 
fresh plaice and soles from Billingsgate. The baby was allowed 
to tumble all over the floor and bite its fingers. 

" How are you this morning, sir," said patrolman Ralph ; 
" it promises to be a pertickelerly fine Sunday does this, and a 
nice one for stroll to see the sights." 

Ralph took down his hat and overcoat from a nail, and bidding 
his wife good-bye affectionately, we strolled out into the streets. 

We took a walk up Newgate street to Cheapside, through the 
Poultry, through Cornhill, passing the Bank and Mansion 
House on our way, and finally 0})posite the Aldgate Church, 
with its curious old Sir Christopher Wren spire, we found our- 
selves standing against the railing which encloses a little green 
square of grass belting the church. 

" Now, sir," said Dick Ralph, "we are just going into one of 
the worst places in London. There's a regular mob here all 
the time, and hits just as much as a man can do to pass the 
peddlers without liaving his 'at and coat taken hoff him by the 
Sheenies who are selling of hall sorts of tilings on the Sunday 
market. You can buy hanything from a gimlet here in Petti- 
coat lane to a suit of clothes in Rag Fair." 

Houndsditch is a wide street which runs down from the Aid- 
gate High street to Bishopsgate street. At the other end is 
the street called the Minories, going in the direction of the 



PETTICOAT LANE. 139 

Tower, which frowns upon the river. Here, also, is the district 
called " Petticoat lane," which embraces a number of short 
streets, courts, lanes, and filthy alleys, with such characteristic 
names as " Sandy's Row," Frying Pan alley," " Little Love 
court," " Catharine Wheel alley," " Hebrew Place," "Fisher's 
alley," "Tripe yard," "Gravel lane," "Harper's alley," 
" Boar's Head yard," " Stoney lane," " Swan court," and " Bor- 
er's lane." 

These are only a few of the choice thoroughfares in this lo- 
cality, and all of them are dirty and swarming with a class 
who ol)tain their living in the streets. There are, it is calcu- 
lated, living and doing business in Petticoat lane and its lesser 
triljutaries of streets and alleys, about six thousand men, 
women, and children who profess the Jewish faith, and are in 
humble circumstances, who have to struggle and compete 
with the Irish of the poorer class in the street trades, though 
the Jews have a monopoly of the old clothes' trade. 

Houndsditch is in every way superior to the other streets 
which surround it. It is wider, the shops are of a better or- 
der, and it is noticeable that very few of their doors are open on 
a Sunday morning. As the detective and I passed through the 
street I noticed such names as " Abrams & Son," " L. Benja- 
min," " Isaacs & Co.," " Moses & Son," " Hyams & Co.," and 
other like names over the doors of fruit shops, jeweller shops, 
mercer shops, clothiers, and in one or two instances, over the 
doors of small publics. It is, however, not a common thing to 
find a Jewish name over a liquor shop door in London. 

" We are in the very nick of time to see the show," said 
Ralph to me — it was nearly nine o'clock of the Sunday morn- 
ing, and we had gone down Houndsditch about three of our 
New York blocks. 

" The market is from eight o'clock Sunday morning until 
about two in the hafternoon, and the business is as brisk as can 
be all that time," said Ralph. 

The houses were all old, and all of them had a slouching, 
mean look, with funny gables, grimy windows in the upper sto- 
ries, and qucerly peaked and stunted roofs, overhung by tubular 



140 THE COSTERMONGERS AND RAG FAIR. 

rcfl chimneys, which stood up like rows of corn in a field when 
seen from a distance. 

The people whom we met in the streets had an Eastern look, 
with peculiarly brilliant, almond-shaped eyes, and prominent 
noses. Some others had the Celtic features and spoke to each 
other with the unmistakable brogue. The policemen that we 
met, too, seemed to partake of the characteristics of the 
place, and I fancied that I could trace a resemblance in their 
faces to those by whom they were surrounded. 

Crossing the street, we went through a court about a hund- 
red feet wide, that seemed to lead into a covered shed, from 
which came a din and clamor of voices that was almost deafen- 
ing. 

There was a wooden building like a market covered over, to 
to which we ascended by a flight of three steps. 

" This is the Rag Fair, sir ; I suppose you heard on't before. 
It's a werry strange place, Rag Fair. But don't stop to look 
at anythink, or them as keeps the stands will tear you to pieces 
to make you buy." 

Although I took as much heed as possible of the injunction, 
it was impossible not to look. It was a very queer place in 
more senses than one. To get an idea of it take a section of 
Washington Market, New York, with its stalls and blocks, and 
buyers and sellers ; and on the walls where the pork, mutton, and 
beef are hung to be inspected and sold, and, instead of the flesh 
of the cow, pig, and peaceful sheep, hang hundreds upon hund- 
reds of pairs of trousers — trousers that have been worn by young 
men of fashion, trousers without a wrinkle or just newly scoured, 
trousers taken from the reeking hot limbs of navies and pot boys, 
trousers from lumbering men-of-war's men, from spruce young 
shop boys, trousers that have been worn by criminals executed 
at Newgate, by patients in fever hospitals ; waistcoats that 
were the pride of fast young brokers in the city, waistcoats 
flashy enough to have been worn by the Marquis of Hastings 
at a race-course, or the Count DOrsay at a literary assem- 
blage ; take thousands of spencers, highlows, fustian jackets, 
some greasy, some unsoiled, shooting-coats, short-coats, and 



A CONGRESS OF RAGS. 141 

cutaways ; coats for the jockey and the dog-fighter, for the 
peer and the pugilist, pilot-jackets and sou-westers, drawers 
and stockings, the latter washed and hung up in all their ap- 
pealing innocence, there being thousands of these garments 
that I have enumerated, and thousands of others that none 
but a master cutter could think of without a softening of the 
brain , take two hundred men, women, and children, mostly 
of the Jewish race, with here and there a burly Irishman sit- 
ting placidly smoking a pipe amid the infernal din ; and shake 
all these ingredients up well, and you have a faint idea of what 
I saw in Rag Fair. 

Take five thousand pair of shoes, boots, gaiters, bootees,' bro- 
gans, watermen's boots, shoes of criminals, and suspicious- 
looking boots, taken from the feet of thieves, flashy-looking 
women's gaiters and cordovans purchased from prostitutes and 
wretched women in garrets, who had sold them to buy food or 
a drink of gin. 

Take all these articles, scatter them around, hang them on 
nails and hooks depending from greasy stalls ascending to the 
old tumble down roof, and then the reader will have a dose 
offered to him such as I got when I fell on Rag Fair, Petticoat 
lane. 

It was by far the strangest scene I had ever looked upon. 
London has nothing like it elsewhere, and New York, which is 
really destitute of any specially salient characteristic, could not 
in fifty years' time organize and bring together such a mass of 
old clothes, grease, patches, tatters, and remnants of decayed 
prosperity and splendor. In every old tattered trousers there 
was an unwritten epic; in every gaudily fashioned waistcoat 
there was a tale perhaps of sorrow and sadness and want, if 
any one could but point it out. 

The patches and rents that were botched up and mended, 
showed the hasty repairs in the old coats that hung in ])latoons 
and files from the niches-, the jagged sewing and frayed edges 
in each of these old garments, could they speak, would tell 
an astonishing tale, or furnish the groundwork of a plot for a 
popular drama. 



142 



THE COSTERMOXGERS AND RAG FAIR. 



The stalls were in rows, and the men and women and boys 
who did bnsiness tlicre kept running about all the time I re- 
mained in the fair, shouting and screaming like possessed be- 
ings. Their great aim and object was to catch some unfortu- 
nate visitor by the lappcl of his coat or snatch his elbow, his 
coat-tail, or any other available part of his clothing, hold on to 
liim, shake an old waistcoat in his face, and if he didn't Avant 
a waistcoat, shake a dirty old ])air of trousers in his face, talk- 
ing all the time in an imploring, or may be a trembling tone, 




BAO FAIB. 



until the man would be compelled to break away by sheer force 
or call the police, who seemed to have enough to do in this 
place. 

I stopped fpr a moment to look at a stall where about a hund- 
red pairs of boots and shoes were displayed in rows, the thick- 
soled heavy-looking brogans of the laborer ranged next to the 
nicely-fashioned gaiter of the elegant, with their well-turned 



MODUS OPERANDI OF SELLING. 143 

toes and arching insteps, and the man, a sliaq>featurcd Hebrew, 
who was proprietor, seized me and thrust a second-hand pair 
of boots in my face, saying at the same time : 

" You wan'sh a nish pair o' bootsh ? S'help, I shells you 
tliish pair for two shillings, and they wash never made lesh than 
a guinea and a half ! Don't you want to buy these sphlendid 
bootsh ; s'help me, I only makes'h two pensli ?" 

I tried to get away, but he held to my arm and kept shaking 
the boots, while his sharp, black eyes glittered like sword points 
at the prospect of losing a sale. At last the detective, losing 
patience, jerked him away, and we passed on to the next slop 
stand. 

This was kept by an old Irish woman. The Jew was all 
mercantile acerbity and sharpness. This old humbug of a 
female Celt was all treacle and lioncy. 

" Ah, then, it's the foine gentleman that ye are. It's easy 
to see the good dlirop is in ye. May be it's a likin' ye'd be 
taking to this splilindid waistcoat ; that's all the fashion now, 
and it's well it 'id look on yer fine figger. And don't ye want 
nothing at all to wear ? And shure ye wouldn't be afther goin' 
naked like an omaudhaun in the streets and havin' the people 
shoutin' after ye ?" 

" How much rent d'ye pay for this stall," said I to her, to 
get her off a topic by which she made her living. 

" Is't the durty rint ye mane ? Well, it's enouff for the ould 
hole. I pay sixpence a day in advance, and tlie devil resave 
tlie penny I've turned yet, tliis blessed mornin. 

" Have you any one to support beside yourself?" 

" Well, indade, I have two childhcr, and its small comfort 
they are to me. One of thim, the eldest, is down wud scarlet 
favir, and the docthor says it tin to one if she'll ever recover." 

" You see sir," said the detective, "the people who rent 
stands from the men as own this place, they liave to pay six- 
pence a day to 'old the stand. But those fellows as you see 
running around like lunatics, and a borin of every one, they 
pays two pence a day rents — cos why they 'ave no stands and 
honly walk liabout with tlie clothes hon their harms." 



144 THE COSTERMONGERS AND RAG FAIR. 

" Yis, and I wish you'd sind them to the divil, the haythens 
— they iiiver give an lionest woman a chance to make a penny 
be hook or be crook, wud thim runnin all over the fair." 

" Halso, we never allows the 'awker as has no stands to 
stay in one place," said Dick Ralph, "cos hif we did, that 
would ruin the business of the people as pays rent for the stands. 
So we keeps them a movin' lion, and they doesn't like it, but 
we have got to do it, or else they would have rows hall the Sun- 
day through with the nobs as keeps the stands. You see, the 
wery minute one of the 'awkcrs gets hopposite a stand, he col- 
lects a crowd and — now, there goes one now ;" and he pointed 
to a fellow Avith a pair of trousers, who was bawling his- goods 
out while a policeman had him by the neck shoving him along 
by main force. 

" Oh, some of these lads are precious 'ard coves, I tell you, 
to manage. Some of tliem will fight and curse at you like as 
hif they wor made of l)rass. But we never talks long to them, 
'cos hif we did Rag Fair would be too much for the force." 

" How much a day do the hawkers make on an average ?" 
I asked Ralph. 

" Well, I can't tell, because they are sich werry 'ardcned 
liars. I axed one the werry last Sunday as I wos 'ere. Says 
I, 'old Benjamin, how much do you take in on a day's work on 
a have rage ?' " 

"Oh ! blesh your 'art," sez he, "some days I hash two pounds 
profit, and some days I makes a shillin' by 'ard vork." 

" Now ye see," said Ralph, " I knew he was of gaffin me, for 
he was not worth two pounds, body and soul, and I don't sup- 
pose he never made more than half a crown in a day and do his 
best. Then Old Benjamin spends it hall in fish. The Jew 
peddlers here are wery fond of fish on Saturdays. They would 
go without a meal in three days to have a fresh mackerel on 
Sunday. And they are werry pertikler as to who kills the 
meat Ijefore they buys it." 

Determining to make another attempt to see Petticoat Lane 
on a week day, I bade the polite policeman and the highly 
odorous quarter of the Old Clothes sellers, a very good day. 



CHAPTER X. 




FROM NEWGATE TO TYBURN. 

ET us look at Newgate. This stern old 
pile of stones heaped upon stones, grey 
and grim, the burden of wliose sighs af- 
flict the weary skies above. 

Tlie strangest kind of a fascination 
hung over me as I looked at its Gate, cut 
in the deep wall like the entrance to a 
rocky cave. The spiked sill spoke of 
gibbets, the bars and locks and bolts of a felon gang, who drag- 
ged their blind life away, day following day, for them without 
hope, the outside world vacant, dumb and blank as the Ages, 
to their crime begotten souls, whose only music was the clank of 
fetters and the hoarse grating of iron hinges. 

The building itself, covering half an acre, seemed scaled 
like a sepulchre. There was nothing to be gotten out of it, 
one way or the other. No one can have even looked at this 
terrible prison of Newgate without a shudder of despair for his 
kind. 

Only on certain recurring Black Mondays did it yawn like a 
grave in the face of a great swearing mob, to put forth some- 
thing into the open in the shadow of St. Sepulchre's, that was 
half dead ; to take it back after an liour quite dead; and then it 
relapsed into its old, inscrutable dumbness. 

Now Gate of Ivory, now Gate of Horn — now a porch above 
which might be inscribed the despairing legend of the Inferno, 
now a wicket at which the charitable might tap gently, fraught 



1-iG FROM NEWGATE TO TYBURN. 

with messasres of mercy to tlic fallen creatures within — the 
portal of Newgate could assume chameleon hues, not always 
hopeless. 

Next to the spikes of Newgate, the visitor must always mark 
for lasting remembrance, the stones of Newgate doorsteps. 
They are not perhaps more than eighty years old, but they 
look more worn than the jambs of Temple bar — more decayed 
than the wheel windows of the Cloisters of Westminster Abbey. 
They arc ancient through use, and not through time. 

The Hall of the Lost Footsteps at Versailles is but an empty 
name, l)ut the millions of footste})S that have worn Newgate 
stones, must make it an abiding reality. Here have united all 
the crooked roads. Here have fallen the last steps on the 
stones of the ford of the Black River. Beyond the steps has 
loomed the City of Dis. 

How many footsteps ! how many ! 

Lord George Gordon, after the riots and burnings of 1780, 
wrecked and crazy, totters feebly up Newgate steps to die in the 
prison which his murderous associates had attempted to burn. 
Desperate Thistlewood, fresh from the loft in Cato street, where 
his fellow conspirators were dragged — reeking from the mur- 
der of Smithers, whose ghost followed him to the gallows, is 
brought here heavily chained from the Tower Dungeon, in 
which the ministry with frantic fear had at first immured 
him. 

He and his gang will leave Newgate no more save by the 
Debtor's Door, where the Man in the Mask — one of the few 
unsolved mysteries of the Nineteenth century — will do his hor- 
rible office ujKjn them and hold up to the populace-five severed 
heads, Avho at first shudder, but growing hardened by the drip- 
l)ing sight of blood, will cry as the clumsy butcher lets the last 
head fall — 

" Hallo, butter-fingers ! " 

Down Newgate steps at dead of night, how many corpses of 
uncoffined wretches have been borne in sacks, to be dissected 
at Old Surgeon's Hall, over the narrow causeway which skirts 
the prison. 



EXECUTION OF BARRETT. 147 

The dread gaol keeps its secret Letter now. No grapnel 
hauls forth the dishonored carcass of the dead criminal for ex- 
position at the Gemonian steps. 

The place is doul^ly a Golgotha, and murder is buried on 
the spot where it has been slain. 

Here died brave hearted Michael Barrett, the victim of the 
last public execution wliich will ever take place in Newgate, 
just tlirce short years ago. How the huge metropolis seethed 
and boiled like a world-cauldron that day of days ! 

Condemned to die as a Fenian conspirator, lie gave his life 
gallantly for his native land, and in his last hour frightened 
England more than a hundred living Barretts could have 
done. 

1 stood before Newgate with a member of tlic Old Jewry 
force who had seen the execution of Barrett. From the fact 
that the government, after that day, has prohibited any more 
public executions, his description of the scene will be worthy of 
recounting to my readers, Tlie detective was a young man, 
and intelligent beyond his class. We were standing outside 
of the prison gate. 

The lane or street of the Old Bailey, which begins at Lud- 
gate Hill, one block below St. Paul's Catliedral, runs toward 
Newgate street, parallel with Giltspur street which it enters, 
and forms before ending a triangular space of about two 
acres square measurement. At the angle, formed by the Hol- 
born Viaduct, which ends here, (Giltspur street and Newgate 
street,) is the old Church of St. Sepulchre. To the right and 
behind us, we could just trace the ornamented and beautiful 
facade of Christ Clmrcli Hospital. To our left and below us 
was the Sessions Court in the Old Bailey, a i)lace in some re- 
spects like the Tombs Court and the Court of General Sessions 
in New York, were botli courts to be combined. I am thus 
particular in order to show my readers where and how Michael 
Barrett, the last Newgate Aictim, died. 

" Well, you see. Sir," said my Old Jewry friend to me, " the 
"week as Barrett wos Inmg wos a busy week with us. Up all 
night sometimes and all day, searching the holes and corners 



148 FROM NEWGATE TO TYBURN. 

and dark places of the city for Fenians. We got information 
that tliey wos going to blow up St. Pauls, one day — another day 
we lioars that they had a plot to bust hup the Bank of Hingland — 
then they were to burn down the Tower and the 'Oss Guards, 
and tlicn somebody told us tliat they meant to send West- 
minster Ilabbey and Buckingham Palace sky high — and tliis 
■way and that way we wos worrited to death with hinformation. 
One night 1 was detailed to St. Paul's to watch the crypts or 
vaults under the Cathedral, where the Fenians intended to put 
a lot of gunpowder to blow it hup. I staid there all night 
with some more of the men detailed, and a precious cold job 
it "WOS, we liiding among the vaults snapping our fingers and 
shivering like geese in a pond, and not a Fenian -within three 
miles of us. That wos a lark, and the newspapers laughed at 
us, and had comic picters of us standing in the cold, for their 
hedification." 

" Another night "we hexpected them to set fire to the 'Ouscs 
of Parlyment, and a blessed shame it would have been to have 
destroyed sich a fine hcdifice, and there I wos night after night, 
a-playing hide and seek among the galleries and Towers of the 
'Ouse, watching for Fenians and hexpecting to get a stab in 
the back, and all the time I avos wishing as how I could get 
relief, so as to get a pot o' beer in the King's Arms in Par- 
lyment street." 

" Well, Sir, at last came the busting and blowing up of Clerk- 
enwell Prison, and a nice row that made all through England 
— and wliile the fellows as did it walked oif quite cooly — Bar- 
rett and a few more who wos suspected, and who wos as 1 be- 
lieve really hinnocent — of the Clerkenwell afiliir — wos taken 
and tried right over here in the Sessions Court (pointing with 
his hand over the wall of the Old Bailey Court), and he stood 
up in the dock that day as he wos found guilty, and I must say 
he was as brave a man as I ever saw — and defied the big wigs 
and all on them, and said he was not afraid to die, and then he 
told them that if it was twenty lives he would give it for " dear 
Ireland," — thems just the words he said, and although I don't 
like Fenians or Fenianism, I must say for him that he was no 



DYING FOR AN IDEA. 149 

more afraid tlian I was, that is if you can judge from a man' is 
face at such a hawful minute. 

• " The night afore his execution I was in his cell ; I was let 
in by a friend of mine the turnkey, and I spoke to him kindly, 
cos you see I didn't feel exactly like as if he wos a man who 
had committed a common murder or robbed for a living, cos 
why, you see, a lawyer told me as how he was dying for an 
idea, like Russell or Hampden or some others of them Big 
Guns. 

" I sez to him : 

" How do you feel Mr. Barrett ? " 

" I feel well, thank you said he ; " one of the turnkeys wos 
watching him, sitting up with him, and he had a light in his 
cell — he was ironed. 

" They are putting up the scaffold," said he to me without a 
bit of fear. 

^' Yes, and I'm sorry for it," said I, " Mr. Barrett — is there 
anything I can do for you." 

" Nothing," says he, standing up and turning down the book 
which he was reading, his chains clanking around his legs — 
" Nothing — but you sec me the night before I die — tell those who 
employed you that Michael Barret has made his peace with God 
— and is not afraid to die. Tell them," and he commenced 
reciting poetry like, with his eyes on the ceiling of his cell : 

" ^Vliither on the scaffold high 

Or hi the battle's van ; 
Tlie fittest place for man to die 

Is where he dies for man." 

" Them's the lines as near as I can remember, for I saw them 
in a book after, and tliat made me recollect them. 

" During the night they were busy in putting up the scaffold, 
and three or four thousand special constables were sworn in by 
the magistrates, cos why, they were afraid that the Fenians 
would rescue Barrett, and I, as well as every other man, wos 
armed with a six-barrelled revolver. When the morning came 
there must have been a hundred thousand people in the streets 
10 



150 FROM NEWGATE TO TYBURN. 

and all around here. Ilundrcds staid up all night to get a 
chance for a good place to look at him, and there was more than 
three thousand women, and as many children in the cro^\;d 
around the scafTold. The top of the scaffold, I mean the frame, 
was about twelve feet above the street, and the platform was 
about six feet high, so that hevery one was able to see him. 
Fifteen hundred police in uniform were drawn hup around New- 
gate, and to prevent the crowds from pushing or rescuing the 
prisoner, a barricade of trees was built at a distance of two 
hundred feet from the scaffold hevery way. Five hundred po- 
lice in })laiu clothes were among the crowds armed with revol- 
vers, and troo})s were stationed at all the barracks in the city 
so as to be ready for any attempt to save his life. The crowd 
Sir, was for all the world like a surging sea, and people were 
buying and selling of histers, and liquors, ginger beer, whelks, 
fruit and cigars, just the same as if they were at a fair, and 
men and boys were crying l)allads and singing, and some of 
them were peddling Barrett's printed confession. Now you 
see, Sir, that was a humbug, becos Barrett never made no con- 
fession, but they sold just as well as if he had made one, at a 
penny a piece. 

" Well, when St. Sepulchre's bell struck eight, which is always 
the signal, they brought him ought, and although the air was 
cold and some of us were shivering from standing up so long 
without anything to eat or drink, he never trembled at all, but 
looked at every man and woman of all that wos there with a 
smile, and a steady look. 

" ' He's a game un,' I heard many a man say, and our fel- 
lows who had such hard work watching the Fenians by night 
and by day, had no hard feelings agin the brave fellow then. 
The women around the scaffold waved their handkerchiefs to 
him, you see, Sir, the women, bless them, are always up to such 
blessed games, and there was some man in the crowd when the 
rope was put around his neck, who wore a fur coat, and seemed 
like an American, who cried out as loud as he could — 

" Good heart— ^Michael Barrett — this day. All is not lost 
while one drop of Irish blood remains." 



THE PESTIFEROUS PRISON. 



151 



" I saw the man, and I made a jump for him with two of my 
pals, but tlie crowd opened and let him pass tlu'ough, — it 
seemed a purpose like, and just then I heard a roar and a 
great convulsive sob, and the crowd pushed this way and 
crushed that way, almost smothering me, and I nearly fainted 
from the awful squeezing I got, and I picked up a little girl 
from atween my feet, and when I looked up Barrett's body was 
a swinging to and fro from a rope, and all was over, and believe 
me, Sir, I was glad of it when it was over," 




THE LAST EXECUTION AT NEWGATE. 



It was high noon when I arrived at Newgate, and my visit 
was paid chiefly to that part of the prison devoted to the sub- 
sistence of the prisoners. I passed through the corridors and 
passages, and door after door, and hinge after hinge grated as 
I advanced with a companion. All around the prison are the 
liigh walls of the neighboring Iniildings, and attached to them 
are precipitous sheds Avith spikes to prevent the escape of pris- 



152 FROM NEWGATE TO TYBURX. 

oners Avlio may succeed in getting as far as the yard. On top of 
the prison is a huge circular fan which revolves and gives ven- 
tilation to the interior of the jail. This improvement was the 
result of the labors of the great philanthropist John Howard. 

In the old days Newgate was a hell upon earth. During 
the Eighteenth century jirisoners endured the tortures of the 
damned here. Jail birds were shackled to the floor to prevent 
their escape, and mouldy bread and stinking water was given 
them to drink until their stomachs loathed the appearance of 
food. Their beds were of stinking straw, the rain from the 
heavens dripped through the roof upon them, the frost and cold 
eat into their bones ; they festered in dirt, disease, and destitu- 
tion, till their limbs broke out in horrible blains, and ulcers 
and all kinds of agues and dysenteries swept down upon them. 
Then in this terrible state, after rotting for months awaiting a 
trial, they came into the dock at the Old Bailey with the jail fe- 
vers upon them to slay with the pestiferous miasma which exhaled 
from their bodies, judge, jury, and pettifogging attorneys. 

The prisoners were so crowded together in dark dungeons, 
that the air becoming corrupted by the stench, occasioned a 
disease called the " goal distemper," of which they died by 
dozens every day. Cartloads of dead bodies were carried out 
of the prison and thrown in a pit in the burying-ground of 
Christ's Church without ceremony. The effluvia in the year 
1750 was so horrible that it -made a pestilence in the whole 
district. Four judges who sat in the Session, a Lord Mayor, 
several aldermen, and other civic dignitaries were carried off 
by the distemper, together with a number of lawyers and jurors 
present at the trials of Newgate criminals. 

Then at last the prison was cleansed, and a system of venti- 
lation introduced, which made some improvement in the con- 
dition of the prisoners. Still, Newgate was a disgrace to Cliris- 
tendom, and just one hundred years ago Parliament made a 
grant of £50,000 to construct a prison. Beckford, author of 
Vathek, and then Lord Mayor of London, laid the first stone. 
Li 1780, Lord George Gordon, witli his No-Popery rioters, burned 
down that part of the prison which had been constructed, and 



GETTING WEAK IN THE BACK. 153 

set at liberty three hundred of the prisoners confined there. 
.£■10,000 in addition had to be granted before the building was 
completed. 

On an average there are between two and three Imndred 
prisoners held in durance in Newgate, and twelve sessions arc 
held during the year at the adjoining Old Bailey Court for 
their trial. This is called the Central Criminal Court, and 
it is here, in this very court, that Jack Sheppard, Dick Turpin, 
Claude Duval, Sixteen String Jack, Tom King, and all the 
other heroes of the yellow covered literature, were tried, con- 
demned, taken in fetters to Newgate, and from thence to Ty- 
burn Tree to hang by the neck until they were dead. 

The Judges of tlie Old Bailey Court are the Lord Mayor, 
Aldermen, Recorder, and Common Sergeant of London, and the 
Judges of the Courts at Westminster Hall, avIio sit here by 
rotation to assist, by their superior legal knowledge, the in- 
ferior local magistrates. 

The prison is divided into a male and female side, but be- 
yond this there is little classification ; the pick-pocket, the 
swindler, the embezzler, the murderer, are all associated to- 
gether ; while the hardened offender and the one who is merely 
suspected of crime, but too often share the same cell, and feed 
at the same board. 

There are separate cells, so that every one averse to society 
may dwell alone if he or she chooses, but in conversation with 
the turnkeys, I learned that the privilege was rarely claimed. 

" Why, Lord bless your lieart. Sir," said a turnkey to me, 
" there isn't one of the birds in this ere cage that wouldn't go 
down on his blessed knees and beg hoff if he was to be locked 
up alone for forty-eight hours. Ye see, sir, it sickens them, it 
does, to be alone and hear no one's voice but their own. There's 
a few of the high 'uns at first, when they come here, are worry 
hoffish and have a sort of a " how-dare-you-look-or-sj)eak-t(>me- 
air," but before three days they gets weak in the back and then 
they '11 give a guinea a minute to look at a face if it only 
wor a monkey's dirty mug." 

When prisoners become refractory, solitary confinement, for a 



154 FROM NEWGATE TO TYBURN. 

few days, is the pnnisluncnt, and it never fails to tame the 
most intractable. The beds of the prisoners are in tiers one 
above the otlicr, like the berths on an emigrant ship, only that 
they are clean almost to painfulness. The beds consist of a 
hard mattress and coarse coverings, snfficient in all seasons to 
keep them comfortably warm. A plain deal table and bench 
constitute the only furniture of the place, and these, with the 
floor, are daily scrubl:)cd into a state of scrupulous cleanliness 
by the inmates of the cells. There are paved court yards in 
which the prisoners may walk and breathe the small quantity 
of pure air that can circulate between those high and gloomy 
walls, surmounted by formidable spikes to impede the climber. 

I went into the kitchen of Newgate and found it to be a com- 
modious and Avcll-fittcd apartment, very like the kitchen of the 
Reform Club, only not so luxurious, from its want of French 
dishes, and I found here boilers, stoves, ranges, saucepans, ket- 
tles, and all that a chef could need for his cuisine. This Avas 
not the kitchen of the Old Newgate of which iVinsworth de- 
lights to tell, where the hangman used to seethe in a cauldron 
of molten pitch the heads and quarters of victims executed for 
treason, whose several members were afterwards affixed to the 
spikes of Temple Bar or London Bridge. 

I saw the rations of each prisoner served out in tin pani- 
kins and platters, and the bread served was as white as any I 
ever ate. There were three large and beautiful potatoes allot- 
ted to each one, and three ounces of boiled beef, good and 
tender and free from bone, just of the same quality which I had 
seen served a few days before in the barracks of the Grenadier 
Guards down in Westminster. The meat might not have all 
the accessories and sauces which a Delmonico or a Blanchard 
could provide, but it was palatable and tender to the taste. 

On "off" days they have soup and thick gruel for breakfast, 
and sixteen ounces of bread per day. They never get beer, 
butter, milk, cheese, cabbage, tea, coffee, or eggs. 

So, after I had seen all this "bee bread," the hunks of meat 
duly weighed out, the potatoes and lumps of bread packed in 
their panniers and delivered out from door to door — the chief 



HOTEL REGULATIONS. 155 

warder and I began to ascend a very Mont Blanc of iron stair- 
cases, and visited, one after the other, the cells of the wicked 
hive ; in which, God knows, there was no honey making, but 
only wax, bitter as the book which the Apostle swallowed. 

The original " comb," many stories high, had been built in 
one of the former yards of the gaol. The space between the 
different tiers of cells was quite sufficient for ventilation ; but 
the architects had of necessity trusted more to height than to 
breadth, and this increased the hive-like appearance of the 
place. But when I came down again, the remembrance of 
what I had seen fresh upon me, all these iron staircases and 
galleries, all these shining locks, bars, numbers, plates, and 
" inspection holes," all these recrossing and crossing pillars, 
trusses, and girders, made me think that I had just left some 
great, bad exhibition of products of the devil's industry. One 
cell was, in all save its occupant, twin brother to its neighbor 
on either side ; and so on, tier above tier, until the whole nest 
had been explored. I forgot to ask how many feet broad, by 
how many feet long, was each dungeon. 

But here is one — the type of all the rest. It is as large say, 
as a cabinet pa)-ticulier,to hold four, at Vachett's or the Moulin 
Rouge ; but it is given up to the occupancy of one man. It is 
a hundred times cleaner than ever was cabinet in Paris restau- 
rant; and here the lodger eats, reads, and sleeps. His bed- 
ding lies on a shelf on the right corner as you enter the cell. 
It is a pile of rugs, matting, mattress, or some other kind of 
bedding, packed and folded up with mathematical accuracy, 
with an assortment of straps and hooks disposed in correspond- 
ing order. These hooks will, by and bye, at eight o'clock, be 
inserted in rings in the whitewashed cell, when the prisoner 
will make his bed and sleep athwart his cell. 

There are his gas-pipe, his basin, and mug; there is a little 
desk-formed table, which he can prop up with a wooden sup- 
port, to eat his meals upon ; there are his tin panikin and 
wooden spoon, his Bible, prayer-book, and hymn-book, his 
comb, his salt-cellar, with a neat cover of blue paper. Every- 
thing shines, glistens, sparkles, almost as bravely as the gew- 



loG FROM NEWGATE TO TYBURN. 

gaws in Mr. Benson's shop outside. Tlie floor is of sliining 
asplialtc. The covered ceiling is without a flaw. The walls are 
luisniirchcd. A neat copy of the regulations enforced in this 
"hotel" — the code of discipline framed by the Sherifis — are 
hung up for the prisoner's guidance. He has a ventilator, by 
means of which lie can regulate the temperature of his cell ; 
and I noticed that the chief warder had to tell almost every 
prisoner that he was keeping his cell too warm. 

Among the many afflicting scenes that have taken place in 
the vicinity of Newgate, was that of February 23, 1807, when 
two men, named Haggerty and Ilolloway, were hanged for the 
murder of Mr. Steele, on llounslow Heath. The greatest in- 
terest had been excited by the trial of these two men, and an 
immense crowd assembled to witness their execution. 

By five o'clock in the morning every avenue was blocked up ; 
every window that commnnicated a view of the place was 
crammed, and wagons, arranged in rows, groaned under the 
weight of the eager multitude. The pressure of the assemblage 
was tremendous ; and when the criminals had been turned off — 
when they had given their last death struggle — the mass of the 
people began t(j move. But there was no room for them to 
move in. 

Lnmcdiatcly rose the shrieks of affrighted women in the 
crowd, wliieh but increased the alarm, and made each individ- 
ual struggle to get out of the multitude. Hundreds were trod- 
den under foot, and the furious and frightened crowd passed 
over them. 

At last the confusion ceased a little, and the ground became 
comparatively clear. 

Some who had been tin-own down arose but with little dam- 
age, and went home, but forty-two were found insensible, of 
this number twenty-seven were quite dead, of whom three were 
women. Of the other filtecn many had their legs or arms 
br(jken, and some of them afterward died. Since that occur- 
rence barriers have been erected and executions have taken 
I)lace without loss of life. The system of hanging in chains 
lias also been abolished, and Newgate may one day hope, like 
its brother of the Bastille, for the light of freedom to break in 



DRINKING FROxM ST. GILES' BOWL, 157 

upon its licU-holcs, and show to humanity how like devils are 
men clad with a little hrief authority. 

Eighty-three years ago, the last victim, taken from Newgate 
to Tyburn Tree, was hung there upon the gallows in cliains. 
The name of the criminal was John Austin. Tyburn was an- 
ciently a manor and village some miles west of London, and 
on this fated spot, in 1330, Roger de Mortimer was lianged, 
drawn, disemboweled, and quartered, for high treason. The 
gallows was a triangle upon three legs. Long years ago, when 
Dan Chaucer wrote his lays, criminals were taken to Tyburn, 
and hung from a lofty elm tree, wliich overshadowed a brook 
or "burn," hence the term of "Tyburn Tree." The gallows, 
in after years, stood on a small eminence at the corner of the 
Edgeware Road, where a tool-house was subsequently erected. 

Beneath this spot, where the gallows formerly stood, the 
bones of Bradshaw, Ireton, and otliers, who had voted for the 
death of Charles I, re pose, their remains, having been taken 
from their graves, after tlie Restoration, and thrown here. 
Around the gibbet were erected 0})en galleries, like tliose at a 
modern race-course, from whence many thousand people, of 
both sexes, were -wont to feast their eyes on the dying strug- 
gles of the condemned. " Mamma Douglas," an old toothless 
woman, held the keys of these seats, and she was, facetiously, 
called the Tyburn "pew opener." Prices of seats to witness 
the sport, varied from one and sixpence to three shillings, and 
in one instance, a reprieve having arrived for the prisoner in 
time to save his life, the mob became enraged at their disap- 
pointment, and tore up the benches. The criminal was con- 
veyed in a cart to Tyburn, the parson chanting prayer and 
hymn on the route, and in passing tlu'ough the quarter of St. 
Giles, a bowl of ale w^as always offered to the condemned to 
drink, the procession of Sheriffs, Stavesmen, and Constables, 
lialting on the way for the purpose. Among the famous crim- 
inals executed here were Perkin Warbeck, for plotting his es- 
cape from the Tower, 1534 ; tlie Holy Maid of Kent, and lier 
associates, 1535 ; the last Prior of the Cliarter House, same 
year; Southwell, the poet, 1615; Mrs. Turner, hanged in a 



158 FROM NKWGATE TO TYBURN. 

yellow starched nifT, for the poisoning of SirTliomasOvcrhury, 
1G28 ; John Fcltou, assassin of Villicrs, Duke of Buckingham, 
IGOO ; and in 1662 five persons who had signed the death war- 
rant of Cliarlcs I ; 1G84, Sir Thomas Armstrong (Rye House 
Plot); 1705, John Smith, a burglar, having been hung for fif- 
teen minutes, a reprieve arrived, and he was cut and bled, 
which saved his life. Jack Sheppard was hung in 1724; Jona- 
than Wild, the thief taker, in 1725, and Catharine Hayes was 
burnt alive here in 1726, for the murder of her husband, as the 
indignant mob would not suffer the hangman to strangle her, 
as was usual, before the fire was kindled. In 1760, Earl Fer- 
rars, who had murdered his stcAvard, rode from the Tower to 
Tyburn, in his open landau, drawn by six horses, and was 
hanged with a silken rope, the hangman and the mob fighting 
for the rope, while the latter tore the black cloth on the scaf- 
fold to pieces. Oliver Cromwell's body was taken up and here, 
long years afterhe had died, hung from the tree, while his head 
was set on a spike of Westminster Hall. The other famous 
hangings were as follows: 1767, Mrs. Browning, for murder; 
1774, John Rann (Sixteen-Stringed Jack), highwayman; 1775, 
the two Perraus, for forgery ; 1777, Rev. Dr. Dodd, forgery; 
1779, Rev. James Hackman, assassination of Miss Reay: he 
was taken from Newgate in a mourning coach. 1783, Ryland, 
the engraver, for forgery. 1783, John Austin, the last person 
executed at Tyburn. 





CHAPTER XL 

DOCTOR'S COMMONS. 

NE of the queerest old rookeries in Lon- 
don is the little old edifice in Great 
Kni gilt-Rider street, just hack of St. 
Paul's Churchyard, with its nest of 
courts and its ancient quadrangle, where 
people go to get licenses to many — or to 
have divorces granted them, or to exam- 
ine or prove wills — or perhaps to have a suite entered for salvage 
or flotsam, or jetsam, — where David Copperfield paid a thousand 
pounds to receive his matriculation as a proctor. This curious 
old relic of Roman Catholic England, where the wills of the 
British nation are preserved, is known as Doctors' Commons. 
It is a college of civil, canon, and maritime law, and here 
all cases that belong to these three divisions of English law, 
as also divorce suits, are entered, argued, and decided. 

The lawyers who practice here are all well to do, snug, aris- 
tocratic old fellows, and enjoy good living and nothing to do 
as no other disciples of the legal profession can. 

It is called Doctor's Commons because the doctors or stu- 
dents at law used to eat in common, or dine together in a hall 
in the old days when the Archbishop of Canterbury acknowl- 
edged the supremacy of the Sec of St. Peter. 

In the Doctors' Commons are — the Court of Arches, named 
from having been formerly kept in Bow Church, Ciieapside, 
originally built upon arches, and the Supreme Ecclesiastical 
Court of the Province of Canterbury — the other English Ecclc- 



160 doctors' commons. 

siastical Province being tliat of York ; tlic Prerogative Court, 
■where all contentions arising out of testamentary causes, are 
tried ; the Consistory Court of the Bishop of London ; and 
the High Court of Admiralty ; all these courts hold their sit- 
tings in the college hall, the walls of which are covered with 
the richly-emblazoned coats of arms of all the doctors who 
have practiced here fur two hundred years past. 

The Court of Arches has a jurisdiction over thirteen parish- 
es, or " peculiars," which form a " Deanery," exempt from the 
authority of the Bishop of London, and attached to the Prov- 
ince of the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is Primate of Eng- 
land. This court decides, as in the days of Wolsey, in all 
cases of usury, simony, heresy, sacrilege, blasphemy, apostacy 
from Christianity, adultery, fornication, bastardy, partial and 
entire divorce, and many exploded offenses, which in the Nine- 
teenth century become farcical when tried in an ecclesiastical 
court. Fighting or brawling in church or vestry arc also offen- 
ses under the jurisdiction of this absurd old court, but they 
arc seldom or ever brought uj) in these days, as the newspapers 
are sure to seize upon such trials as subjects for derision and 
satire. Still the statutes are in existence and will probably 
never be repealed until the Established Church of England is 
abolished. 

There are several Registries in Doctors' Commons, under 
the jurisdiction of the Archbishop of Canterbury and the bish- 
ops. Some of the very old documents connected with them 
arc deposited for security in St. Paul's Cathedral and Lambeth 
Palace. At the Bishop of London's Registry, and the Regis- 
try for the Commission of Surrey, wills are proved for the 
respective dioceses, and marriage licences are granted. At 
the Yicar-General's Office and the Faculty Office, marriage 
licences . are granted for any j)art of England. The Faculty 
Office also grants Faculties to notaries public, and dis])ensations 
to the clergy ; and foryierly granted privilege to eat flesh on 
prohibited days. At the Vicar-General's Office, records are 
kept of the confirmation and consecration of bishops. 

Marriage licences, when required by persons who profess the 



MARRIAGE LICENSES. 161 

faith of the Established Church of England, are always pro- 
cured in Doctors' Commons upon personal application to one 
of these old fogy Proctors, whom 1 saw running around the 
quaint quadrangle, like a hen on a hot griddle, with a roll of 
papers in his fleshy, fat hands. A residence of fifteen days is 
necessary to either bride or bridegroom, in the parish in which 
the marriage is to be solemnized, or not much longer than it 
takes a repeater to become a useful if not a legal voter in New 
York City. This little antique court of Doctors' Commons is 
in fine one of the pious swindles that the English people de- 
light in perpetuating and groaning under, while the sinecurists 
make pots of money, and laugh and grow fat on the pious 
plunder. There are all kinds of little dodges in Doctors Com- 
mons, so that when a suitor enters here it is like a dip into 
chaiiccry litigation ; the victim being plucked before lie leaves. 
Even to get married is very expensive in Doctors' Commons. 
The expense of an ordinary license is .£2 12s. 6d. ; but if either 
party is a minor, there is 10s. 6c?. further charge ; and if the 
party appearing swears that he has obtained the consent of the 
proper person having authority in law to give it, there is no 
necessity for either parents or minor to attend. A special 
license for marriage is issued after a fiat or consent has been 
obtained from the Archbishop, and is granted only to persons 
of rank, judges, and members of parliament, the Archbishop 
having a right to exercise his own discretion. 

Tlie expense of a Special License is usually twenty-eight 
guineas. This gives privilege to marry at any time or place, 
in private residence, or at any church or chapel situate in Eng- 
land ; but the ceremony must be performed by a priest in holy 
orders, and of the Established Church. With the marriages 
of Dissenters, including Roman Catholics, Jews, and Quakers, 
tlie Commons has nothing to do, their licenses being obtainable 
of the Superintendent-Registrar. A Divorce when souglit is 
carried through one of the courts in this profession (according 
to the diocese), and is conducted by a proctor; the evidence of 
witnesses is taken privately before an examiner of the court, 
and neither the Imsband, wife, nor any of the witnesses, need 



162 



doctor's commons. 



appear personally in court. A suit is seldom conducted at an 
expense less than .£200. 

Then there is the High Court of Admiralty, a " precious old 
swindle," as a sea-faring man told me it had proved to him. 
He was a seaman before the mast, and to get a sum of eight 
pounds six and four-pence, he was compelled to pay eleven 
pounds of costs and fees. It comprises the " Instance Court," 
and the " Prize Court," where the famous Lord Stowell, hi one 
year, adjudicated upon 2,206 cases connected with the high 
seas. 




DOCTOR S COMMONS. 



The Instance Court has a criminal and civil jurisdiction ; to 
the former belong piracy and other indictable offences on the 
high seas, which are now tried at tlic Old Bailey ; to the latter, 
suits arising from ships ruiuiing foul of each other, disputes 
about seamen's wages, bottomry, and salvage. The Prize 
Court applies to naval captures in war, proceeds of captured 
slave-vessels, <fec. 



A silver oar is carried before the Judge as 



PAYING THE PIPER. 163 

an emblem of his office. The business is Tcry onerous, as in 
embargoes and tlie provisional detention of vessels, when in- 
cautious decision might involve the country in war ; the right 
of search is another weighty question. 

The practitioners in this court are advocates (D.D.C.L.) or 
counsel, and proctors or solicitors. The judge and advocates 
wear in court, if of Oxford, scarlet robes and hoods lined with 
taflfety ; and if of Cambridge, white minever and round black 
velvet caps. The proctors wear black robes and hoods lined 
with fur. 

The College has a good library in civil law and history, be- 
queathed by an ancestor of Sir John Gibson, judge of the Pre- 
rogative Court; and every bishop at his consecration makes a 
present of books. 

After a case has been worked slowly through one of these 
ecclesiastical courts, it is then transferred to another, and after 
bowling the cause about for years it is just possible that it 
will be lost for the suitor. Suits arc brought in Doctors' Com- 
mons for the most ridiculous and trivial causes, and once a 
man gets into the Commons, he is made to pay the piper while 
the sleek, fat proctors, dance right merrily to the music paid 
for by their unhappy victims. A case in point I will mention. 
The cause had just been tried in the Archdeacon's Court, at 
Totness, and from thence an appeal had been sought in the 
Court at Exeter, thence it went to the Court of Arches, and 
from there to the Court of Delegates, and after all this fuss 
and expense, the question in discussion was to know which of 
two persons had the legal right to hang a hat on a certain peg! 
This is sober truth, and no exaggeration. 

But the great perfection of legal scoundrelism was, in a case 
where a man, named Russell, whose wife's character had been 
impugned by a person named Bentham, at Yarmouth, was tried. 
This gentleman could find no remedy in Common Law for the 
defamation, so he must needs go to Doctors' Commons and the 
Ecclesiastical Courts. The Proctor's bill amounted to £700 after 
the case had gone through several courts, and finally each 
party had to pay his own costs after the case had been contiu- 



lG-4 doctors' commons. 

iicd six or seven years ; the special beauty of Ecclesiastical 
Courts beinjr, that once a victim brings a suit, he is never al- 
lowed to withdraw it until it has gone the rounds of every 
court, thus giving fees to a score of persons, one-half of whom 
never hear of the case until they make up their minds to send 
in a bill for money. Finally, after seven years of this pious war- 
fare, Mr. Russell, being a poor man, was ruined, and his wife's 
character was not half as good as when he began the suit. 

The Prerogative Will Office is, however, the busiest and 
most interesting place in Doctor's Commons. Wills are always 
to be found here at half an hour's notice, and generally in a 
few minutes. They are kept in a fire-proof, strong room. The 
original wills begin with the year 1483, and the copies date 
from 1383. The latter are on parchment, strongly bound, with 
brass clasps. Here I saw the will of Shakesj^eare, on three 
folios of paper, each with his signature, and with the inter- 
lineation in his own hand-writing : " I give unto my wife my 
brown, best bed, with the furniture." There is kept, also, the 
will of Milton, which was written when the poet was blind, 
and set aside by a decree of Sir Leoline Jenkins. And I 
saw alongside of Milton's will, the last testament of the sol- 
dier of democracy, Napoleon Bonaparte, made at St. Helena, 
April, 1821. 

In one year 40,000 searches were made here for wills, and 
7,000 extracts were made from testaments. There were, also, 
5,000 commissions issued for the country. Some of the entries 
of wills made by the early ]\Ionks are beautiful specimens of 
illumination, the colors remaining fresh to this day. 

Let us take a look into the Will Office, and give a glance to 
one of the most interesting phases of the drama of human life. 

People are passing raj)idly in and out of the narrow court, 
their bustle alone disturbing the marked quiet of the neighbor- 
hood. At the end of the court, we ascend a few steps and open 
a door, when the scene exhibited in the sketch is before us. 
All seems hurry and confusion, the solicitors turning over the 
leaves of bulky volumes and folios at the desks, long practice 
having taught them to discover at a glance the object of their 



THE FORGOTTEN SAILOR. 165 

search ; rapidly to and fro move those who are bringing the 
tomes and taking them back to the shelves where they belong, 
and as rapidly glide the pens of the numerous copyists who are 
transcribing or making extracts from wills, in all their little 
boxes, along both sides of the room. 

But as we begin to look a little more closely into the densely 
packed occupants' faces, we see persons who are certainly not 
solicitors' clerks, nor officials of Doctor's Commons, but parties 
whose interests in a worldly point of view may be materially 
benefited or damaged by the investigations they are ordering to 
be made. 

Even the weather-beaten sailor, whose rugged face one would 
take to be proof against any fortune, betrays a good deal of 
sensibility. He has just returned probably from some long 
voyage, and one can fancy him to have come to Doctor's Com- 
mons to see whether the relative, whom the newspapers have 
informed him is dead, has left him, as he expected, the means 
to settle down quietly in a little box at Deptford, Greenwich, 
or Camberweir, or some other sailor's paradise. 

He steps up to the box on the right hand as directed, pays 
his shilling, and gets a ticket, with a direction to the calendar, 
in which he is to search for the name of his deceased relative. 
He must surely be spelling every name in that page he has 
turned over — ah, there it is at last ; and now he hurries off, 
as directed to, with the calendar, to the person pointed out to 
him as the Clerk of Searches. A volume from one of the 
shelves is laid before him, the place is found, and there lies 
the object of his hopes and fears — the great hopeful or threat- 
ening will. Line by line his face begins to grow darker — a 
ghastly grin at last appears — he has not been forgotten — there 
is a ring perhaps, or five pounds to buy one, or some such trifle ; 
he closes the book with a bang and a curse, and the sailor hur- 
ries back to his ship and to storm and danger on the deep, de- 
prived of all the contentment that had so long made him satis- 
fied with his hard lot. 

But here is another picture. A lady dressed in a style of 
the most gorgeous splendor, whose business is of a more im- 
11 



166 



doctors' commons. 



portant kind than a mere search — she is probably an executrix 
of a will — and is just leaving the office, when she meets at the 
door another lady, to whom she makes a low courtesy, with an 
expression of decided malice on her showy countenance. The 
successful legatee can be seen in her face, wliile blank and 
startled disappointment appears in the other woman's fea- 
tures. 

Such is Doctors' Commons — and Such is Life. 




1 




CHAPTER XII. 

THE BOHEMIANS OF LONDON. 

OIXG east through Oxford street, when you 
get near High Holborn, there is a narrow 
tlioroughfare called Dean street. Turn down 
l) this and it will bring you to Carlisle street, a 
short and dark lane, a street only in name. 
This short street brings you to Soho Square, 
famous for its sauces and pickles all over the world from Cal- 
cutta to New York. 

The neighborhood is a very quiet one, as by its peculiar exits 
and passages it is cut off from the busiest part of London on 
either side of it, and leaving the Holborn or Oxford street, 
with their crowded traffic, shops, busses, and cabs, in a moment 
you are in this quiet square, with its little dot of green, fresh 
grass ; that seems a relief after the arid business waste which 
you have just left. Just opposite is Greek street, which leads 
to St. Martin's lane, where a nest of small dealers in milk, 
butter, eggs, and groceries herd together, and where the poor, 
mean chop-houses form a perfect rookery, from which comes 
the fumes of hot coffee, muffins, mutton chops, and kidneys all 
the long day. Little dirty, rosy-cheeked children play here in 
the gutters right merrily all the day through, and the noises of 
the peddlers' cries, and the joyous mirth of the children " glori- 
ous at their games," are the only sounds that break the remark- 
able stillness of the noonday hour. 

When the gray in the sky begins to deepen, and the shades 
of night fall over and around this quiet square, then the scene 



168 THE BOHEMIANS OF LONDON. 

changes, and life and bustle and noisy interchange of voices 
fill the solitary place, which the shabby gentility of the neigh- 
borhood cannot repress or keep down. Then the coffee- 
shojjs become vocal, the pot-houses are once more vivacious, 
and streams of thirsty and hungry men and women pour into 
these places, and come out refreshed with beer and replete with 
cheap but plenteous food. This neighljorhood is savory with 
macaroni and oils, betokening the presence of the Italian ele- 
ment, who flock to Soho Square in great numbers when they 
arrive iii London. There are " albergos " and wine-shops where 
you may obtain a quarter of a fowl for ninepence, and a bottle 
of Marsala, wdiich is only a darker and stronger sherry under 
another name, and you can get olives and brandied cherries, at 
dessert, for a few pence. The women who attend in these 
places are fat, jolly-looking persons, with rounded forms, finely 
shaped faces, and magnificent black hair, done up in massive 
bands, and they sit many hours of the day knitting on low stools 
at the doors of these foreign-looking inns. The customers who 
frequent these places are wealthy organ-grinders, men who cast 
figures from potters' clay and plaster of Paris, musicians and 
porters in the Italian warehouses along the docks, medical stu- 
dents, Bohemians, and the riff raff in general. One of the clay 
figure men wanted to sell me a well executed full length figure 
of Thackeray, with his spectacled, kindly face, at 7s. 6d., for 
which I was asked a guinea in Drury Lane, the workmanship 
and material being fully as good in every essential. 

In the heart of Soho Square is this little dark Carlisle street, 
and in the centre of Carlisle street is a small, dingy public- 
house, called the " Carlisle Arms," which is one of the resorts of 
the Bohemians of London. 

This old place has Ijccn from time immemorial frequented by 
them, and here I was brought one cool September evening by 
the head clerk of one of the leading publishing houses of Lon- 
don. This clerk was still a young man, but he had the best 
knowledge of books and general literature that I have ever 
found in a man of his position. He knew at a glance how much 
a book would bring, who wrote it, when it was published, and 



II 



cockerell's lodgings. 169 

how many copies were to be got, were they to be dug out of the 
mustiest book-stall in London. He had a familiar acquaintance 
with all the members of that strange tribe of litterateurs who con- 
tribute to the magazines and weekly and daily press of this the 
greatest newspaper city in tlie world. He knew wlio it was who 
wrote the last flash novel, how nuich he got for it, and whether 
lie liad drunk the proceeds or not. Every first and fourtli class 
reporter in London, all the dramatic witlings and punsters, the 
great shorthand guns of the House of Commons, tlie book re- 
viewers, and the dramatic and musical critics, were to him 
everyday acquaintances, and they all in turn paid liim a cordial 
respect for his universal knowledge. I shall call him Cocker- 
ell, this marvel of booksellers' clerks. 

At 8 o'clock I called at Cockerell's lodgings, which were in 
Rupert street, near Holborn. He lived quietly in a nice, cosy 
room, filled with rare and curious editions of the works of 
which he was most fond, and everything around the place, from 
tlie brass andirons to the quaint clock in the chimney place, 
betokened a steady-going, well-informed man. The " Newgate 
Calendar," " Cruikshank's Almanacs," for twenty years, finely 
illustrated, "The Slang Dictionary," " The Streets and Anti- 
quities of London," " A History of Signboards," "Hansard's 
Debates," a folio "Shakespeare," "The Heads of tlie People," 
illustrated by Kenny Meadows, "Debrett's Peerage," "The 
Lords and Commons," several volumes of Balzac, a volume 
with the wills and autographs of the Doges of Yenice, " Mac- 
aulay's Lays," some of " Sala's Sketches," a bound series of 
the Saturday Mevietv, and some volumes of " Punch," were 
among his collection, besides a complete collection of the 
British plays, and a number of Gilray's sketches, framed, hung 
from the walls. " Show me a man's library, and I will tell 
you what he is," somebody has said, and I believe tlie above 
works, picked out of a large library, best explain the charac- 
ter of the head clerk who was to be my companion for the 
night's adventure. Putting on his collar, gloves, and an old 
slouch-hat, Cockerell and I reached the hall, where the maid- 



170 THE BOHEMIANS OF LONDON. 

servant, looking suspiciously at the writer, inquired from her 
master what time he would be home. 

"1 don't know, Jenny, exactly," said he, "but it will be some 
time before the cocks crow." 

Having arrived at the "Carlisle Arms," we walked in, passing 
the bar, and found our way through a low passage into a back 
room about twelve feet wide by fifteen in length. The ceiling 
was low, and there was no ornament to be seen with the excep- 
tion of a steel engraving of the Duke of Wellington on horse- 
back, surrounded by a mounted staff, and surveying through a 
field-glass the broken columns of the first Bonaparte from an 
elevation on the plain of Waterloo. There were but three per- 
sons in the room, which had a round oaken table in the centre, 
and a quadrangle of wooden benches, — when I entered. My 
well-informed friend was saluted with hearty greetings by all 
present, and was asked what he would have to drink. This is an 
anachronism in English customs, for the people of this tight 
little island generally allow a friend to pay for his own drink, as 
a custom which has long ago been endorsed by the best authori- 
ties. There is no such folly known here as may be seen in 
every American public house, where the free and independent 
electors stand at a bar each hour in every day, treating one 
and the other with a promiscuous and reckless generosity. But 
among Bohemians all over the world it is different. If they 
cannot pay for a drink, they will call for it and treat each other 
with a liberality which is, to say the least, a most praiseworthy 
trait. 

I forgot to mention that there were two vases, with faded 
artificial flowers, on the rusty old chimney-piece, and these 
flowers seemed to the Bohemians like the waters of an oasis 
in the desert to a party of Bedouins. All else was a blighted, 
sandy waste of small talk, tobacco smoke, and weak gin and 
water. The principal spokesman of the party, who was quite 
bald-headed and had but two or three teeth, rang the bell be- 
hind the door, and presently the pot-boy appeared. In the 
lowest of London publics the pot-boy waits upon the customers, 
washes the pewter pots, and cleans the tables with a dishcloth, 
for a stipend of ten shillings a week in British coin. The pot- 



li 



A PINT OF COOPER. 



171 



boy had not more than made Iiis appearance when in came the 
bar-maid, with natural light hair, one of the first bar-maids I 
had seen in London whose hair was not dyed. 

The bar-maid surveyed the room and its occupants calmly, 
then asked for the orders. The pot-boy, feeling that he was 
only a subordinate, retired in disgust, with his dish-cloth on 
his left arm. One man called for "sherry weak," another for 
"gin and water," and a third for a " pint of cooper." The 







A BOHEMIAN CAROUSE. 



cooper was brought in a metal mug, wiih hoops girding it, and 
for this reason, I believe, the mug is called a "cooper." Pret- 
ty soon the room began to fill with stray Bohemians, who drop- 
ped in one by one and took their seats as if tlicy feared no 
eviction. 

In half an hour there were a dozen present, and the room 
was so crowded that two of tliem liad to stand up. One or two 
were dandies, and wore heavy scarfs and i)ins, and talked 
French because, forsootli, tlicy liad been on the Continent. 



172 THE BOHEMIANS OF LONDON. 

Some of tlicm were artists on the half score of comic week- 
lies which are to be seen in the windows of every news-shop in 
London. Some were wood-engravers, some were painters in a 
small way, and there were correspondents of the Birmingham, 
Manchester, and Liverpool papers also present. All were in the 
literary or artistic line, and a few had been in the gallery of 
the House of Commons as reporters, doing shorthand work, 
and there was one really clever artist, who had illustrated books 
by some of tlic best authors in England. This man was a lit- 
tle scant of hair on the top of the forehead, and had a light 
moustache. He had been to many prize-fights, and had gloated 
over many a frightful murder, through his sketches in the week- 
ly illustrated newspapers. He was a merry, good-natured fel- 
low, with a genuine fund of pleasant anecdote and a liking 
for Burton ale. 

There was another man very quiet in appearance, and wear- 
ing a gray mixed sack coat, with his bosom open in the style 
of AValt Whitman. He puzzled me when I first looked at 
him, but after a while I found that he was a German by birth, 
very recondite, — from Lower Prussia, domiciled in London for 
many years, who had written a work with the mystical title of 
" Entities of God." None of his intimates had ever even read 
this book ; with the exception of one man, (a dear friend,) who 
was in his debt, and had honored his friendship so far as to read 
the preface, but could not get any farther for a dififerent reason 
from that assigned by the Jleidelberg student, who, after read- 
ing a work of John Stuart Mill, threw down the book in disgust, 
saying that " it was too cle/ir ; " yet he Avas respected in this 
mixed assemblage of topers and clever fellows, because he had 
written a book that no one could understand. Such is the force 
of intellect. 

There were two Irishmen present who sat in a corner togeth- 
er, drank together, gave each other a light for the pipes which 
they smoked, and quarreled with a fraternal regard. 

One was an old man with a grey moustache, an Orangeman, 
who had been in America in the old days when Virginia and 
South Carolina ruled the Senate of the republic, and since then 



THE RADICAL AND CONSERVATIVE. 173 

he had been a correspondent by turns for some of the London 
newspapers abroad, and again a literary hack for the shabby 
sheets that are read in the obscure holes of the city. His friend 
was a much younger man, full blooded, and a thorough Irish 
Nationalist, although he disclaimed Fenianism. He was a re- 
porter, and had an extensive knowledge of his professional 
associates on the London press. His name was Fitzgerald, and 
his venerable friend was known as Dawson. The German of 
the profound intellect was called Meyer, or Herr Meyer. The 
names of the French dandies I have forgotten ; they were but 
poor specimens, and did not furnish any entertainment during 
the evening. 

There were two reporters of the morning press at this feast 
of reason and flow of beer, but they did not contribute much 
amusement to the party, as they were discussing the respec- 
tive rates of salaries on the Daily Bludgeon and the 3Iorning 
Budget during the entire evening's conversation. The two 
Irishmen were perpetually at loggerheads about politics, 
" Fitz " being a Radical, Dawson a Conservative Churchman 
of the old school. Occasionally they gave each other the lie, 
and then I expected to see them striking out at each other ; 
but in three minutes after they would vow eternal friendship, 
and shake each other's hand with great warmth. The name 
of the artist was Sullivan. Sullivan hailed the head clerk with 
great feeling, and as he sat down there was a drink all around. 

" "Well, old Cockerell," said the vivacious Fitz, " how is 
Slogger's book getting on with yeer people ? " 

"It 'ill soon be published. We have it on hand now, and 
expect to sell twenty thousand copies. The pictures will sell 
it alone, although, I must say, Slogger's text is very good for 
his su1]ject. We are getting all the trade now. Every fellow 
that thinks he can scribble comes to us, and the big fish are 
also in our net. Murray must have been cut up pretty bad 
to find Gladstone leaving him and going to McMillan. It all 
comes of having a magazine. A publishing house that can 
command the columns of a well circulated magazine can print 
as many books as they like, and, what is better, they can sell 



174 THE BOHEMIANS OF LONDON. 

f 

them. Our house does the heavy flash business, and it pays 
well. Old ' Swoslam' is a keen blade, and is always on the 
lookout for a novelty. McMillan has sold, I'm told, four edi- 
tions of their magazines having the Byron article. Well, old 
fellow, how arc you (to Sullivan), and what are you doing ? " 

" I'm f hoinc, me dharling, and me appetite is just as good 
as ever, but me powers of dhrinking are failing fast. As for 
what I'm doing. Miss Sthabber has got me to make pictures for 
her new novel, which she got a hundred and fifty pounds for in 
the ' Thames Mag.,' and now she is going to publish it in book 
form. It's a nice title she has for it, " The Red Divil of the 
Yallow Mountin ; or, the Ghost of the Place de Greve.' I 
sometimes think the woman is going crazy whin she sinds for 
me in the mornin' to talk to her about her new books down 
Brompton way, where she lives. I generally find her in bed 
wdth a decanther of brandy, a pot of coffee, and a square box 
of cigarettes by her bedside on a table. ' Soolivan,' said she, 
' I want two Convent scenes in the sixth chapter ; a rocky pass, 
with a skeleton standing in the middle of the gap, his grisly 
arms outstretched, for the ninth chapter ; and in the fifteenth 
chapter you must give me a powerful tableoo where the chief 
butler is discovered in the room off the banquetting hall pois- 
oning his misthresses's wine. 

" ' For the details I'll trust to your powerful Irish imagination ; 
and now, Soolivan, you low blackguard, turn your back and 
help yourself to the brandy while I'm putting on me wrapper, 
as I don't wan't you to be making fancy pictures of ' Vamis 
going to the Bath,' or any such gammon as that, for pot- 
houses, with the great female London novelist — I believe that's 
what they call me, isn't it, Soolivan ? — as an original.' In- 
dade, I think that Miss Sthabber is more nor half mad, but I 
must say that she is the divil at plots and incidents, and she 
drinks excellent brandy." 

"Stabber is a clever woman,'" said Cockerell, the head 
clerk. "Whackem & Co., Paternoster Row, sold thirty-two 
thousand copies of her ' Blue-Eyed Demon' in three months, and 
she refused X950 for it from an Edinburgh house, so Whackem 



I 



THE SHORT-HAND REPORTER. 175 

must have given her more. By the way, do any of your fellows 
know the name of this man who has written the last new novel 
' Girded with Steel ? ' I fancy he must be one of your news- 
paper fellows, because he has a lot of stuff in it about ' leader 
writing,' ' my note-book,' ' two columns is more than earth- 
quake should be allowed in a newspa])cr,' and there are, be- 
sides, the details of editorial life which an outsider could not 
know. Who is he ? " 

"Oh, he's a young reporter on the Omniverous Clam, but I 
could not give his name on a pint of honor," said Fitz, " He's 
a clever chap, though, and will make his way. He's only been 
two years in the professhion, and he's the best short-hand man 
on the Clam now, so maybe you know who I mean now." 

" It's Billingsgate," said one. 

" No, it's Gravelly," said another. 

" Boys, ye are not right ; it's Goby, and he's five hundred 
and fifty pounds the betther of it, which is a nice little lump for 
a reporther who gets five guineas a week, and has to work like 
a horse for that in the session," said Fitzgerald. 

" Reporthers have harder work now then they had whin I 
first went in the Gallery," said old Dawson. " Me father, as 
yez know, boys, was a reporther before me ; and I might say 
it runs in the family. Ah ! thim were good times, boys, when 
the ould man did his short-hand wurruk. He knew all the 
great reporthers of the day ; and fine fellows they were, too. 
There was William Radcliffe, the husband of the woman who 
wrote all the bloodthirsty novels. Radcliffe was a mimry re- 
porther, and he'd go to the House and sit the debates out, and 
nivir take a note at all, at all. Then he'd go to the office and 
dictate two different articles at a time to the juniors who took 
it all down, and out it came, sphick-and-sphan, in the morning, 
without a flaw. 

" Then there was another grate fellow, ould Billy Woodfall, 
who had a paper of his own called the Diary ; and that was 
before the House allowed the reporthers to take notes during 
the debates. They used to call him " Mimory Woodfall," be- 
cause he'd never forget anything, that he had heard ; and when 



176 THE BOHEMIANS OF LONDON. 

strangers would come from the country to visit the House the 
first (incstions they would ask would be, ' Which is Woodfall ? ' 
' Whicli is the Sphaker ? ' Me fawther told me many a story 
about bim. He had a fashion of bringing hard-boiled eggs with 
him, wliich he carried in his hat, and whin he came to the House 
he'd take off his hat carefully, put it between his knees, take 
the eggs out, keeping his head well down for fear the Sargint- 
at-Arrums would see him eating, and then he'd brake the 
shells and eat the eggs with as great relish as if they were 
game pies. A reporther on an opposition paper wanted to play 
a joke on Billy one night, and when he laid his hat down he 
took the two hard-boiled eggs out and put two in the hat that had 
nivir been boiled at all, and when Billy wint to crack the shells 
the yoke sphattered all over his breeches, bedad, so it did. Bil- 
ly nivir forgave the joke until the day of his death. Woodfall 
did all his own reporthin', and the Diary did well for a time, 
until the Morning Chronicle started in opposition, with Perry 
at the head of it. Perry hired a lot of reporthers to take notes 
of the debates and write them out, and by the time that Wood- 
fall had his notes written out, the Clironicle was selling in 
every sthrect in London ; and that was what took all the wind 
out of poor Billy's sails." 

" Perry was a foine reporther himself, and when the House 
was thrying Admiral Palliser and Admiral Keppel for their 
loivcs, Perry'd send in eight or ten colyums every week of the 
debates, without any assistance ; but, bedad, we wouldn't think 
much of that now. Woodfall used to say, in a joking way, 
that ' he had been fined by the House of Commons, confined 
by the House of Lords, fined and confined by the Coort of 
King's Binch, and indicted in the Ould Bailey,' for his offinces. 
Oil, them were foine times, bedad, whin you could go in and get 
ycr nice chop and yer glass of sherry, or a sweet little sthake 
fresh from the rump, and maybe have the Juke of Wellington 
and George Canning sitting at the same table wid ye ; and 
they'd be at the chops and sthakes too." 

" Dawson, me boy, tell us about Mark Supple and the Qua- 
ker, and take another jugfull of beer to wet ycr whistle," said 



A SOXG FROM THE SPEAKER, 177 

the artist, who had just withdrawn his nose from the pewter 
pot wliich he was now sadly contemplating in its mournful 
emptiness, 

"Oh! is it Supple ye mane, Jimmy, I'll tell ye all about 
liim, yer riverencc, and I'll take a pint of sthout to strinthin' 
me nerves afore I begin. "Ye see," said Dawson, after he had 
taken a long pull at the mug, " Mark was fondher of a joke 
than he was of his breakfast. He was a good reporther, too, 
and liked a little dhrop now and thin, like more of his coun- 
thrymin, God forgive thim. One night Mark was in the gal- 
lery reporthing for the Morning Chronicle, when Mr, Adding- 
ton was the Sphaker. Mark was a big, raw-boned native o'f 
sweet Tipperary, and was fond of hearing a song at all times. 
He used to take a glass of wine or two in Bellamy's, and thin 
go up in the gallery and take out his note-book and whack 
away with the pot-hooks and colophons. Mark was a foine 
scholar and a janius. They say he'd dhress up a mimbir's 
speech, and put retterick and flowers and poethry into a dull 
six-mile oration, and it used to puzzle the mimbirsso that they 
would hardly know their own words again. Of course, they all 
liked Mark, and he sometimes took a good dale of freedom with 
thim, 

"He had a mighthy quare style intirely with him, and an 
English mimbir who was fond of a joke, like Mark's self, said 
that Mark's style of reporthin' was ' a mixture of the hyperbol- 
ical, with a vane of Oriencalism and a dash of the. bog-throtter.' 
They are quick enough, God knows, to sneer about^ the poor 
bog-throtters. Well, this night was a quiet one in the House. 
A number of the mimljirs were asleep, some were nodding, 
some were at their dinners; and when Mark looked down from 
the gallery the Sphaker, Mr, Addingion, had nothing to do, and 
there was a silence in the House so that you mioht have heard 
a pin dhrop. All at once Mark called out in a^ reckless loud 
voice : 

" ' A song from Mr, Sphaker.' 

"You can imagine the horror of Mr. Addiugton as he stood 
up, his tall, thin figure stretched to its full linth, and his 



178 THE BOHEMIANS OP LONDON. 

peevish eyes scanning the House from top to bottom. Every 
one roared out laughing, and William Pitt had the tears 
sthraming down his ould, withered cheeks. After a while the 
House recovered its gravity, or rather its stupidity, and the 
Sarjint-at-Arrums began his search for the man who had hal- 
looed in the sacred place. He went up among the reporthers, 
who all knew the offindhir ; but none of the boys would tell 
on Mark, who was well liked ; and, bedad, the Sarjint-at-Arrums 
was bursting his skin with rage. Seeing that he could not get 
any information, he turned to Mark, who was looking as solemn 
as a toomstone, and asked him if he knew who had called for 
a song." 

" Mark purtended that he was very busy witli his pencils, and, 
nivir sayin' a wurd, pointed his finger to a fat Quaker who sat 
asleep, two or three seats off, with his hands clasped quietly 
over the pit of his stomach. The Quaker was seized in a min- 
ute, and given into the custody of the House, vainly declaring 
his innocence, and was kept in confinement two hours, until 
Mark, in a manly way, acknowledged his crime, and was put 
in the Quaker's place, to meditate on his foolishness. He was 
brought to the Bar of the House thin, and let off, whin he prom- ■ 
ised to do bctthcr in the future, and nivir call upon the Sphaker 
for another song." 

" Tell us about Supple and Wilberforce, Dawson," said Fitz- 
gerald to the veteran. 

" Oh, that wasn't Supple that played the thrick on Wilber- 
force : that was Pethcr Finnerty," said Dawson. "Petherwas 
on the Chronicle; and one night, when the House was full of 
business. Pother sat drinking too long in Bellamy's and lost 
his turn. Wlien he got into the House, he asked some of the 
boys, who had been sphakin'? One of them who had been pres- 
ent told Pethcr that Wilberforce had been sphakin' for an hour. 

" ' What did he say ?' says Pether. 

" ' Take out yer book, and I'll give it to ye, me boy, in a jiffy,* 
says the otlicr. Pether was so far gone that he would have 
made Wilberforce say anything, however ridiculous, and when 
the other reporther began as follows, he did not see the joke : 



THE BEAUTIFUL POTATO. 179 

" ' Potatoes make men healthy, vigorous, and active ; but, 
what is still more in their favor, they make men tall ' — 

" Did he say that, the jewel ?" said Pether, who was touched 
with this tribute to the esculent of his native isle. 

" I'll give you my word, he said it, — ' and when I look around 
this house, and see before me such fine, vigorous specimens of 
Irish manhood, all reared on the potato, and think of my own 
stunted, weak figure and attenuated frame, I must always re- 
gret and lament that my parents did not foster me on that fra- 
grant and genial vegetable, the beautiful potato.' " 

' Oh ! murther !' said Pether ; ' but Wilberforce is the fine 
fellow to use such poetical language ;' and off he wint to the 
Chronicle office to write out his notes. And the next morning 
there it was — the thribute to the potato and all the rest of it — 
and all London was laughing at Wilberforce, and every one 
believed that he was drunk when he spoke the words. The 
next day Pether was brought before the bar of the House to 
stand his trial, and Wilberforce rase and said : 

" ' Mr. Speaker and Gentlemen : Were I capable of using 
such language as was attributed to me in a morning journal, in 
its reports of yesterday's debates, I would be unworthy of the 
attention which I now claim from this House and unfit to oc- 
cupy a seat in this honorable body. Rather would I be worthy 
of a straight-jacket in a lunatic asylum, where I might learn 
better sense of the dignity of this House.' Pether was let off, 
like Mark Supple, and he was ever afterwards very careful in 
his reports. But the joke stuck to Wilberforce's coat for many 
a long day afther." 

By this time the greater part of the Bohemians had left for 
their homes, and after a song and a few more stories from Fitz 
and Sullivan, the erratic band broke up, and the tajM'oom was 
deserted. Such was the scene — a singular one — which occurs in 
the old dingy Public House night after night among the wander- 
ing journalists and penny-a-liners of the London press and their 
associates of kindred professions. The old, haunted Public 
could tell many a ludicrous story of a like kind had it a tongue 
to speak — of the amusing, wandering, never-do-well Free Lances, 



180 



THE BOHEMIANS OF LONDON. 



of tlic Press, wlio find food and clothing, and a good deal to 
drink, by their eplicmeral contributions to the journalistic and 
light literature of England's metropolis. 

In addition to the "Carlisle Arms" there is another resort 
of tlie higher class of writers, authors, and artists, in the neigh- 
borhood of the theatres, and this place is known to those who 
frequent it as the "Albion." At the Albion, there is an excel- 
lent restaurant, and well-cooked viands, and wines of the best 
quality, may be obtained there at reasonable prices. Choice 
little dinners, illuminated by wit and humor, are given here by 
journalists to each other. 



S^J^A 





T O \V E li (J 1'" 1- O N L» N 




CHAPTER XIII. 

TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 

HE sun has risen and set for a thousand 
years on its gray walls ; the grime and 
verdure of a thousand years have ce- 
mented its hoary stones ; nations have 
grown and decayed ; dynasties have been 
founded and wrecked irretrievably ; a New 
World has been discovered, and inventive 
genius has almost changed the face of the earth and yet tlie 
Tower of London, (cemented by the blood of beasts, as the 
fable has it,) which saw the beginning and progress of these 
changes, still endures, and will no doubt endure to the end of 
time. 

It seems a long, long time ago, that bleak Christmas day 
of the year 800, when the Pope of Rome placed the Iron Crown 
of Lombardy upon the annointed head of Charlemagne under 
the dome of St. Peter's, amid the huzzas of the multitude of 
Prankish warriors and barons who witnessed the sacred cere- 
mony, and yet far back in that nearly barbarous age, the 
chroniclers tell us in their scholastic volumes of the monaste- 
ries, that a Tower existed in London and on the same spot 
where now the wardens patrol in their red tunics and explain 
historical conundrums to dull Cockneys. 

And some of the chroniclers go farther back and profess to 
believe that the Tower is as old as the Roman occupation of 
Britain, and do not hesitate to say that Julius Caesar, who 
has been accused of so many good and bad deeds, was the 
founder of the old forbidding pile of masonry. 
12 



184 TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 

• 

Be that as it may, it is old enough to liavc earned a lasting 
infamy, only once deserved in history by another grim for- 
tress, — its twin brother and accomplice in blood and oppression, 
the Bastile of Paris. That foul excresence on the fair face 
of the Earth has been swept away by the stormy sea of a 
people's vengeance, while the Tower of London still remains 
as a lesson of tradition, to tell of the crimes tliat God has per- 
mitted kings and dwellers in high places to perpetrate against 
the peo})le, who have suffered and died and made no sign. 

The charge to see the Tower of London is only sixpence in 
these days, and for a sixpence a visitor may see everything ; 
dungeon and trap door, axe and scaffold, crown jewels and 
prison bars, the cages and the dungeons and graves of those 
who suffered and died here during the long night of centuries, — 
and all this for a paltry sixpence. 

Amid the tramp and thunder of a hundred battles it has 
stood unshaken ; it is too strong for the destroying hand of 
man ; and time, as if in reverence, has trod lightly as he 
has stepped over its massive walls. 

1 saw its towers ; four of them, standing up against the sky, 
bellshaped and surmounted by weather vanes, one day from 
London Bridge, and having a curiosity to see a structure, which 
even more than Westminster Abbey is coeval wdth authentic his. 
tory, I walked slowly to Tower Hill, passed along the firm 
drawbridge, paid a sixpence and entering under the spiked port- 
cullis, I found myself in the Lion Tower which stands at the 
corner of the moat or Tower ditch facing the Thames. 

The extent of the Tower within the walls is twelve acres 
and five roods. The exterior circuit of the ditch — now a garden, 
or rather an apology for a garden — surrounding it, is three thou- 
sand one hundred and fifty-six feet. On the river side is a 
broad and handsome wharf or graveled terrace, separated by 
the ditch frcnn the fortress and mounted with sixty pieces of 
ordnance, which are fired on the royal birthdays, or in celebra' 
tion of any remarkable event. From the wharf into the Tower 
is an entrance by a drawbridge. Near it is a cut or short canal 
connecting the river with the ditch, having a water entrance 



DELIVERING THE KEYS. 185 

called the " Traitor's Gate," — State Prisoners having been for. 
raerly conveyed by this passage to Westminster, where the two 
Houses of Parliament now sit, for trial. Over the Traitor's 
Gate is a building containing the waterworks which supply the 
interior with water. 

Within the walls of the fortress are several streets. The 
principal buildings which it contains are the White or princi- 
pal Tower, the ancient Chapel of St. Peter-ad- Vincula, the 
Ordnance-Office, the Record Office, the Jewel's House, the Stone 
Armory, the Grand Storehouse, and the Small Armory, besides 
the house belonging to the Constable of the Tower and other 
officers, the barracks of the garrison, and the sutler's shops, 
commonly used by the soldiers. It is generally a regiment of 
the line which serves as a garrison for the tower. 

Tlie principal entrance to the Tower is to the west. It con- 
sists of two gates on the outside of the ditch, a stone bridge 
built over the ditch, and a gate at the end of the bridge. 

These gates are opened every morning with a strange, and 
for the Nineteenth century, a very fantastical ceremony. 

The Yeoman-Porter with a sergeant and six men march 
to the Governor's house for the keys. 

Having received them, he proceeds to the innermost gate, and 
passing that, it is again shut. He then opens the three outer- 
most gates at each of which the guards rest their firelocks while 
the keys pass and repass. The gravity with which the guards 
perform this ceremony, and the nice precision with wliich they 
manoeuvre, is calculated to make everybody but an Englishman 
laugh. 

On the return of the Yeoman-Porter to tlie innermost gate, 
he calls to the warden on duty to take the Queen's keys, when 
they open the gates, and the keys are placed in the warden's 
hall. 

At night the same formality is used in shutting the gates ; 
and as the Yeoman-Porter and the guard, return with the keys 
to the Governor's house the main guard which, with its offi- 
cers, is under arms, challenges liim saying : 

" Who comes there ? " 



186 TOWER PALACE AND PRISON. 

He answers : 

" Tlie Keys." 

The challenger replies : 

" Pass Keys." 

The guards by order rest their firelocks and the Yeoman-Por- 
ter says : 

" God save the Queen." 

The soldiers then answer back : 

" Amen." 

The bearer of the keys then proceeds to the Governor's 
house and there leaves them. 

After they are deposited with the Governor no person can 
enter or leave the Tower without the watchword for the night. 
If any person obtains permission to pass, the Yeoman-Porter 
attends him and the same ceremony is repeated. 

The Tower is governed by its constable, called the Constable 
of the Tower, and the Chief Nobleman or principal person 
next to the blood royal, not including the Archbishop of Can- 
terbury, is chosen to hold this office by the Queen. At corona- 
tions and other state ceremonies this officer has the custody of 
and is responsible for the regalia. Under him is a lieutentant, 
deputy-lieutenant, commonly called governor, a fort-major, 
gentleman porter, yeoman porter, gentleman gaoler, four quar- 
ter-gimners, and forty warders. The warder's uniform is the 
same as that of the Queen's Guards, or Beef Eaters. 

It is rarely that the Tower is used as a State Prison, in these 
days. When prisoners are detained here, by ajiplication to 
the Privy Council they are usually permitted to walk on the 
inner platform during part of the day, accompanied by a 
warder. 

The fire wliich took place toward the winter of 1841 de- 
stroyed a great portion of the grand armory, and materially al- 
tered the features of the Tower. The armory, said to have been 
the largest in Europe, was three hundred and forty-five feet in 
length, and was formerly used as a storehouse for the artillery 
train, until the stores were removed to Woolwich. A very 
large number of chests with arms ready for any emergency 



IN THE lion's mouth. 187 

were in a part of the room which had been partitioned off; 
and in the otiier part a variety of arms were arranged in elegant 
and fanciful devices. 

A fearful destruction of property, at once curious and valua- 
ble, took place in this department ; but one beautiful piece of 
workmanship being preserved. 

This was the famous brass gun taken from Malta by the 
French in 1798, and sent with eight banners which hung over 
the gun, to the French Directory by General Bonaparte, in La 
Sensible, from which vessel it was captured by the English 
man-of-war. Seahorse. 

In the Lion Tower, at the entrance, were kept the wild beasts 
in the olden times, for the amusement of such monarchs as 
James I, who was too cowardly to look upon any strife but that 
of chained or caged animals. Here were kept lions, tigers, 
bears and bulls, wild boars, dogs and fighting cocks. About one 
hundred and fifty years ago a young girl who was employed as 
servant by one of the keepers, being of a rather bold and cour- 
ageous temper, she took pleasure now and then in feeding the 
lions, and witli great imprudence one day ventured to be a lit- 
tle more familiar than usual with the king of beasts, relying 
upon his gratitude because she was in the habit of feeding 
the animals. This time she Avcnt too close to the cage of the 
lion, who caught hold of her arm and tore it from the shoulder 
like a shred of rotten cloth, and before any one could come 
to her assistance, he gave her a terrible gripe and killed her 
instantly. 

Another individual who had charge of the lions and fed 
them had a very narrow escape from their claws, and he has 
related his story as follows : 

" 'Twas our custom," he says, " when we cleansed the lion's 
den to drive them down over night into a lower place in order to 
rise early in the morning and refresh their day apartments by 
cleaning them out ; and having through a mistake, and not for- 
getfulness, left one of the trap doors unbolted which I thought 
I had carefully secured, I came down in the morning before 
daylight, with my candle and lantern fastened before me to my 



188 TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 

button, with my implements in my hands to despatch my busi- 
ness, as was usual, and going carelessly into one of the dens, 
a lion had returned through the trap door, and lay couchant 
in the corner of the den, with his head toward me. The sud- 
den surprise of tliis terrible sight brought me under such dread- 
ful apprehension of the danger I was in, that I stood fixed like 
a statue, without the power of motion, with my eyes steadfast 
upon the lion and his likewise fixed upon mine. 

" I expected nothing but to be torn to pieces every moment, 
and was fearful to attempt one step back, lest my endeavor to 
shun him might have made him the more eager to hasten 
my destruction. At last he roused himself, as though to have a 
breakfast off me ; yet, by the assistance of Providence, I had 
the presence of mind to keep steady in my posture, for the rea- 
sons before mentioned. 

" He moved toward me, but without expressing in his coun- 
tenance either greediness or anger ; but, on the contrary, wag- 
ged his tail, signifying nothing but friendship in his fawning 
behavior ; and after he had stared me a little in the face, he 
raises himself up on his two hindmost feet, and laying his two 
fore paws upon my shoulders, without hurting me, fell to lick- 
ing my face, as a further instance of his gratitude for my feed- 
ing him, as I afterwards conjectured ; though then I expected 
every moment that he would have stripped my skin, as a 
poulterer does a rabbit, and have cracked my head between his 
teeth, as a monkey does a walnut. 

" His tong-ue was so very rough, that with the few favorite 
kisses he gave me, it made my cheeks almost as rough as a 
pork griskin, which I was very glad to take in good part with- 
out a bit of grumbling, and when he had thus saluted me and 
given me his sort of welcome to his den, he returned to his 
place and laid him down, doing me no further damage ; which 
unexpected deliverance occasioned me to take courage, that I 
shrunk back by degrees till I recovered the trap door, through 
which I jumped and pulled it after me, thus happily through an 
especial Providence, I escaped the fury of so dangerous a crea- 
ture." 



THE BISHOP OF DURHAM A PRISONER. 



189 » 



The Tower was for many hundreds of years an object of 
suspicion to the good citizens of London, who deemed the mas- 
sive fortress a standino: threat ag-ainst tlicir rights and privi- 
leges. Whenever a monarch wished to wrest concessions from 
the Londoners, to wring a large sum of money from their fears, 
or commit some other act of despotism, it was customary, just 
previous to the attempt against tlie people, to strengthen the 
Tower in its weakest part, and a ditch, or a wall, or a bastion 
was constructed, to enable the Governor or Constable of the 
Tower to hold the fortress for his Lord the King, in case the citi- 
zens should resist the attempt on their purses or their liljcrties. 

How little the gaping Cockneys and bulbous-eyed rustics, 
who stroll around through the different apartments of this 
mighty castle, know or even dream of the great deeds, terrible 
crimes, and high resolves of those who have inhabited this 
Tower of London during a thousand years of its most eventful 
and troubled history. 

One dark 
night during 
the first years 
of the reign of 
Henry I, be- 
fore the Trai- 
tor's Gate had 
attained such a 
terrible fame as 
it afterward ob- 
tained from the 
number of the 
victims who 
have passed un- 
der its grimy 
arch, never to 

pass out except to the block on Tower Hill, a shallop with 
two men whose arms lie between their feet at the bottom of 
the lioat, and a third whose arms are bound, stops at the wall 
where the Water Gate is now shown, and in reply to the sum- 




traitor's gate. 



190 TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 

mens of one of the armed men, the portcullis is hoisted, and 
Ralph Flambari,, the fighting, choleric, and rebellious Bishop 
of Durham, passes under the arch a prisoner to the King, and 
the massive iron gates, rusty even then, are shut firmly ere the 
sound of the boat's oars have been heard by the wardens in 
the Inner Tower. 

In a few days he makes a number of friends among the ofii- 
cials of the Tower by his merry temperament, and as state pris- 
oners were always allowed to furnish their own tables in the 
fortress, the jolly bishop has many a heavy carouse. Tun after 
tun of hippocras, canary, and sack is conveyed to him, and he 
dispenses those medieval beverages to the knights and men-at- 
arms — pages and guards, with no stinted measure. One even- 
ing the Bishop receives a long and strong coil of rope in a 
puncheon of Malmsley, and that very night, after he had drank 
all the knights, men-at-arms and wardens under the oaken 
tables, the jolly bishop flies to the ramparts, lowers himself 
down into the ditch, and like the plucky prelate that he was, 
escapes from Henry's wrath. 

One fine summer day when Henry III is King of England, 
Cardinal Pandulph, the Legate of the Pope, presents himself 
and a long train of attendants, with sumpter and service mules, 
at the land postern of the Tower, and after a loud flourieh of 
trumpets to announce his arrival, the Cardinal is admitted to 
the presence of the King ; and throws a bag of Rose nobles on 
the table before the young monarch, for in those days the 
Majesty of Britain did not scorn to borrow 200 marks of Car- 
dinal Pandulph, and one hundred marks of Henry, Abbot of 
St. Albans. The money market was very tight in those days, 
and Kings often held dealings with pawn-brokers, for we find 
Henry VIII pledging or melting down nearly all the crown 
regalia to satisfy his creditors. 

There is an apartment of very large and fine proportions in 
the third story of the White or Main Tower, supported by two 
rows of beams. The timber ceiling is flat, and the walls are 
pierced with windows on one side and heavy arches appear on 
the other side ; the whole structure being of the rudest con- 



COUNCIL CHAMBER OF THE TOWER. 191 

striiction, yet grand looking withal ; and this is he great Council 
Chamber of the Tower, in which some of the most startling 
and memorable scenes in English history have occurred. 

It is Monday, September 29, 1399. The day, which was 
overcast in the early morning, has turned out fair and bright, 
and the Council Chamber and all the approaches to it are 
crowded with the highest nobles, temporal and spiritual, in the 
land ; steel clad knights, mitred abbots, proud bishops, grave 
judges in cap and ermine, peers and lackeys, stand on the 
stairs and in the ante-rooms, to catch a word or get a look at 
the coming grand historical farce which is to end at last in a 
terrible tragedy. 

It is the Feast of St. Michael the Archangel, and as the sun 
streams through the stained glass of the oriel windows, and 
the shouts of the London prentices at their games of ball, are 
wafted to the warder on the battlements, who carries his par- 
tisan to and fro ; a deputation from each house of Parliament, 
headed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Percy, Earl of North- 
umberland, and other great Nobles, enters the Council Chamber 
to hold a conference with the reigning Monarch Richard II, 
now about to resign his Crown to the Protector Bolingbroke, 
who afterward as Henry IV, will encounter more vicissitudes 
and suffering than the monarch he is about So cruelly to 
depose. 

The nobles seat themselves, the Protector enthrones himself, 
and a ghastly figure, that of Richard II, stalks moodily into 
the Chamber, clad in kingly robes, his sceptre in his hand, the 
Crown upon his head, and there is silence for a moment among 
all present. Then Richard says in a broken voice, hut dis- 
tinctly, " I have been King of England, Duke of Aquitaine, and 
Lord of Ireland about twenty-one years, which Seigneury, Roy- 
alty, Sceptre, Crow^i and Heritage, I now clearly resign here to 
my cousin, Henry of Lancaster, and I desire him here, in this 
open presence, in entering of the same possession, to take the 
sceptre;" "and so," says Froissart, "he delivered it to the 
Duke, who took it," and kept it, also, he might have added. 



192 TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 

Before a year had elapsed the unfortunate monarch was put 
to death in Pontefract Castle by order of his successor, 
Henry lY. 

On a May day, in 1471, the streets of London resound with 
music, and the populace are all in holiday attire to welcome 
Edward IV, who returns victorious from the battle of Barnet, 
wliere he has slain, in cold blood, Prince Edward, son to Henry 
YI, who is a prisoner in the Tower. Next day Henry dies in 
a suspicious manner, and Edward has leisure for a little while 
to found the Order of the Garter. 

Edward dies, and he is not cold in his tomb before Richard 
HI ascends, or rather usurps the throne. 

Edward has left two boys, the eldest of whom is lawful heir 
to the Crown, by Elizabeth Wydville, his wife. 

One dark night, the wind soughs in the trees and moans 
around the battlements of the fortress, as two men, Miles For- 
est and John Dighton, hired assassins, enter the sleeping cham- 
ber of the two young princes. They steal to the bed, and hav- 
ing covered the mouths of the lads with the bed-clothes and 
pillows, they throw their heavy bodies across the couch. There 
are some faint, stifled moans, for a few minutes, and then all 
is still but the mournful music of the storm without, for the 
murderers have done their work but too well. 

Sir James Tyrrell, who has been in waiting outside to see 
that the bloody deed is accomplished, walks in, looks at the 
distorted features of the children, gives an order in a whisper, 
and the still warm bodies are carried out, and down a dark 
stone staircase, and are buried there beneath a heap of stones 
to moulder till the Resurrection. 

Here comes "William Wallace, patriot and hero, to the Trait- 
or's Gate, in the year 1305, and after lang-uishing in prison for 
months he is tied to horses' tails and dragged forth, through 
Cheapside, and thence to Smithfield, to die the death of a dog, 
his mutilated body being torn to pieces in the presence of a 
noisy and liostile rabble. 

From this place, Sir John Oldcastle, Lord Cobham, is also 
dragged forth to St. Giles, in the Fields, and having been hung 



IMPRISONMENT OP ANNE BOLEYN. 193 

up over a slow fire by a chain from the middle of his body for 
two hours he is slowly roasted to death. He was a follower of 
Wickliffe. 

Tlie Duke of Clarence, brother of Edward IV, is hurried to 
his death in the Tower by Richard III, who orders him to be 
drowned in a huge hogshead of sweet wine ! A mode of death 
chosen, it is said, by the victim himself in preference to any 
other. 

The good and pious Sir Thomas Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, 
eighty years of age, is imprisoned here, and is left to staiTe 
and rot in a dungeon of this place of infamy. His misery is 
such that the man of God has to write Secretary Cromwell, 
minister of Henry VIII : " Furthermore I beseech you to be good, 
Master, in my necessity, for I have neither shirt, nor yet other 
clothes, that are necessary for me to wear, but that be ragged 
and rent too shamefully. Notwithstanding, I might easily suf- 
fer that if they would keep my body warm. But God knoweth, 
also, how slender my diet is at many times. And now, in 
mine old age, my stomach may rot away but with a few kinds 
of meat, which if I want, I decay forthwith." 

When this God-fearing man was taken out to be beheaded, 
his bones showed through his skin, and women wept and fell 
fainting at the cruel sight. 

In the Beauchamp Tower, at the very bottom or foundation, 
is a subterraneous cell known as the " Rats' Dungeon," a hide- 
ous hell-hole, below low-water mark, and dark as the despair 
of the human souls who were confined there in the days when 
men were fond of cutting each others' throats for conscience 
sake. At high water, thousands of rats sought shelter in this 
dungeon until the floods subsided. Woe be to the poor wretches 
there confined when the rats swarmed in, screaming like hu- 
man beings in agony. 

In this den, prisoners were starved when the rack had failed 
to wring a confession from them. Here all their shrieks 
and struggles were drowned deep in this infernal hole with 
only the eye of the Almighty to look upon the maddening hor- 



19-1 TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 

rors •which the wretched prisoners had to endure before Death 
came to relieve them. 

One night with the rats was enough, — at break of day only 
a heap of gnawed bones remained to tell the tale. 

In one of the upper stories of the Tower there is an apart- 
ment with one grated window and a rough oaken planked floor, 
where Anne Boleyn was confined when her royal paramour had 
determined to send her neck to the axe. The unhappy woman, 
as she passed through the Traitor's Gate, read her fate in its 
dread aspect, and as she passed beneath its arch she rose in 
the barge, fell on her knees and prayed God to have mercy on 
her, and defend her from her Royal lover's rage. When she 
was shown her apartment, its naked and forbidding aspect ter- 
rified her sore, and she cried out in a maniacal frenzy, " It's 
too good for me, Jesu have mercy upon me." Then she knelt 
down weeping and laughing like a mad woman. When her 
head lay on the block the executioner was afraid to strike off 
her head, as she refused to have her eyes bandaged, and at last 
he had to take off his shoes, and cause another person to ap- 
proach her while he came from behind and clumsily hacked 
off her head. 

When the Marchioness of Salisbury, an aged and venerable 
lady, was led to execution, she stoutly declared she was not a 
traitor, and refused to lay her head on the block, and the 
headsman was compelled to follow her all around the scaffold, 
striking at her as if she was a bullock, until finally her gray 
head was hacked off. 

The Princess Elizabeth, afterwards Queen of that name, hav- 
ing been suspected of complicity in the hasty insurrection of 
Sir Thomas Wyatt, she was committed to the Tower by order 
of her sister. Queen Mary. 

As she passed under the Traitor's Gate, through which her 
mother, Anne Boleyn, and Wyatt (who had fought for her) 
had preceded her, the proud heart of Elizabeth failed her and 
she burst into tears. At first she refused to get out of the 
boat, but seeing that force would be used, she cried out to the 
rowers — 



LADY JANE GREY ON THE SCAFFOLD. 195 

" Here landeth as true a subject, being a prisoner, as ever 
landed at these stairs ; and before Thee, oh God, I speak it, 
having no other friend than Thee." 

Proceeding up the stairs she seated herself, and being pressed 
by the Lieutenant of the Tower, Sir Thomas Brydges, to rise, 
she answered : 

" Better sit here than on a worse place : for God knoweth 
and not I, whither you will bring me." 

She lived to be Queen of England, and the mercy which was 
shown to her she refused to many a poor wretch, whose bones 
Elizabeth allowed to be gnawed clean and bare in the " Rat's 
Dungeon." 

One more scene of horror. 

As Lady Jane Gray passed out of the Tower by the postern 
gate to Tower Hill, she beheld the lieadless corpse of her hus- 
band (who had just been decapitated) carried out on a cart to 
be buried in the Tower chapel of St. Peter-ad-Vincula. 

" Ah, Guilford, Guilford," said she, " the ante-past is not so 
bitter that thoii hast tasted, and which I soon shall taste, as to 
make my flesh tremble ; it is nothing compared to the feast 
of which we shall this day partake in Heaven." 

Then she passed on to the scaffold. 

When on the scaffold she turned to the crowd and said : 

"And now good people all, while I am yet alive, I pray of 
you to assist me witli your prayers." 

Then she knelt, and turning to Father Feckenham, the 
Queen's chaplain, asked him : 

" Shall I say this psalm ? " 

And Father Feckenham, who was afterwards Lord Abbot of 
"Westminster, answered : 

" Yea." 

Tlien she said the psalm Miserere Met Deus and stood up and 
gave her book, gloves, and handkerchief to her two attendant 
ladies ; and she commenced to untie her gown. 

The executioner said : 

" Shall I assist you to disrobe, Lady Jane ?" 

She answered him quickly : 



196 TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 

" Nay, leave me in peace," and her two ladies advanced and 
disrobed her. 

The headsman then desired her to stand on the straw, after 
her ladies had tied a kerchief about her eyes, and as she com- 
plied with his request, she asked him : 

" Will you dispatch me quickly ? "Will you take it off before 
I lay me down ?" 

" No, Madam," said he to the last question. 

Then Lady Jane felt fbr the block, her eyes being bandaged, 
and groping, she said : 

" Where is it ? Where is it ?" 

Laying her head on the block, she said slowly : 

" Lord, into tliy hands I commend my spirit," and at that 
instant, her neck being bared, there was a glitter of steel, a 
dull thud, and her head rolled in the sawdust. 

The Jewels and Royal Regalia are kept in a glass case, well 
guarded by a warden, who is never allowed to leave the apart- 
ment for an instant, unless when relieved. There is a charge 
of sixpence extra to see the Jewel House, and a constant stream 
of visitors may be found in this part of the Tower, the ladies 
particularly taking a great interest in the splendor of the royal 
treasures. 

St. Edward's Crown, first worn by Charles II, has since his 
time been worn by all the monarchs who have ascended the 
throne of Great Britain. This is the identical crown stolen 
by the daring Col. Blood, and the one which was placed on the 
head of Queen Victoria when she was crowned in Westminster 
Abbey, nearly two hundred years after it was stolen. It is a 
very magnificent one, surmounted with a cross of diamonds. 
The new crown, made purposely for her Majesty, is also here, 
and is made of purple velvet, hooped with silver, and richly 
adorned with diamonds. The ruby in it is said to have been 
worn by Edward, the Black Prince, five hundred years ago, 
and the sapphire in it is considered to be of great value ; the 
crown altogether is estimated to be worth £100,000. King 
Edward's Crown is supposed to be worth at least .£200,000. 
The Prince of Wales' Crown is formed of pure gold, without 



THE CROWN JEWELS. 



197 




1. Qucpn's Dhidem. 2. rrince of Wales' Crown. 
8. Old Imperial Crown. 4. Queen's Crown. 

5. Queen's Coronation Bmcelets. 

6. Temporal Sceptre. 7- Spiritual Sceptre. 



198 TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 

many jewels, while that of the Queen's Consort, formerly worn 
by Prince Albert, is enriched with pearls, diamonds and other 
precious stones, and is worth about <£ 80,000. 

The Queen's Diadem, valued at £75,000, was made for 
Maria d'Este, the unfortunate Queen of James II, who stood 
cowering in the rain and sleet, under the walls of Lambeth 
Church, that awful night wlien her husband abdicated, and 
William, Prince of Orange, landed at Torljay. Before James 
crossed the river at "Westminster, to join his wife in their flight 
from England, he threw the Great Seal of Britain into the 
Thames. 

St. Edward's Staff, a part of the regalia, is four feet seven 
inches long, bearing at the top an Orb and Cross, the orb con- 
taining, it is said, a portion of the Cross on which our Saviour 
died. 

The Staff is made of beaten gold, to the bottom of which is 
fixed a steel spike, no doubt intended for defence, as a strong 
arm would be able to drive it through any assailant. Nothing 
is known authentically of the history of this Staff, but it is sui> 
posed to date back as far as the time of the Crusades, on ac- 
count of the portion of the cross which it is said to contain. 

The Royal Sceptre is of gold, ornamented with precious 
stones ; also with the rose, shamrock, and thistle, cmljlematical 
of England, Scotland, and Ireland, all in gold ; the cross is 
richly jewelled, and contains a large diamond in the centre ; 
the length of the Sceptre is two feet nine inches, and it is 
valued at X 40,000. 

The other jewelled articles of the regalia are valued at 
£300,000, and are as follows : 

The Rod of Equity is three feet seven inches in length, and 
is made of gold set with diamonds. The Orb at the top is en- 
circled with rose diamonds, and in the cross, which surmounts 
it, stands the figure of a dove with wings expanded. This is 
sometimes called the Sceptre with the Dove. Another sceptre 
called the Queen's Sceptre with the Cross, though much smaller, 
is very beautiful in design, and thickly set with precious 
stones. 



I70RY SCEPTRE AND SWORDS OF JUSTICE. 



199 



The Ivory Sceptre was made for Maria d' Este, and another 
sceptre, found behind the wainscotting in the apartment in 
which the regalia was kept, is said to have been made for the 
Queen of William III. 




1. Imperial Orb. 2. Golden Salt Cellar of State. 
S. Anoiating Spoon. 4. AmpuUa. 



There are also two other Orbs, well worthy of observation, as 
arc also the Swords of Justice, the Ecclesiastical and Temporal ; 
and the Sword of Mcycy or the Curtana, as it is called. This 
is pointless, as so is its title, which could have no point when 
the sword was wielded by an English monarch. 

Then there is the Ampulla, to hold the Holy Oil for anoint- 
ing the foreheads and palms of the hands and necks of sover- 
13 



200 



TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 



eigns. It is said that Queen Victoria dispensed with the 
anointing of her royal neck, fearing that it might soil a very- 
costly lace chemisette which she wore at her coronation. The 
Ampulla is made in the shape of an eagle, and the base holds 
the oil. Besides the jewels already mentioned, there are sev- 
eral others, among which are the Armillae, or Coronation Brace- 
lets, made of gold and rimmed with pearls ; the Coronation 
Spoon, for pouring out the oil, wliich is very ancient ; and the 
Golden Salt Cellar, shaped like a castle, with Norman turrets, 
windows and doors. Then there are other salt cellars, a bap- 




STATE SALT CELLARS. 



tismal font, where the royal children are baptised, a silver 
wine fountain, and many other valuables which I have not 
room or desire to enumerate. Altogether, the crowns, dia- 
dems, sceptres and other articles of the regalia, arc worth 
about seven millions of dollars, and they are of no use what- 
ever, excepting for show. 

It must be remembered that hundreds of people die annu- 
ally of starvation in London, while these jewels, valued at seven 
millions of dollars, are growing rusty, and every shilling which 



A DESPERATE ADVENTURE. 201 

bought these jewels was wrung from the blood, labor, and 
misery of the ancestors of the radical voters who compose the 
English Trade Unions, and follow the standard of John Bright. 
A just and honest Parliament would order the sale of these 
Crown jewels, and the sum realized might find many happy 
homes in the New World for those who now starve in the rook- 
eries and lanes of London. 

There is only one attempt to steal the English Crown Jewels, 
mentioned in history, and that was a most audacious one, 
and planned with a skill worth}'^ of the man who made the at- 
tempt. 

The robbery was committed by Col. Thomas Blood, in 1673. 

He was a native of Ireland, born in 1628. 

In his twcntictli year he married the daughter of a gentle- 
man of Lancashire ; then returned to his native country, and 
having served there as a Lieutenant in the Parliamentary 
forces, received a grant of land instead of pay, and was, by 
Henry Cromwell, son to Oliver, made a Justice of the Peace. 
On tlie Restoration of Charles II, the Act of Settlement, which 
deprived Blood of his possessions, made him at once discon- 
tented and desperate. He first signalized himself by his con- 
duct during an insurrection set on foot to surprise Dublin 
Castle and seize the Duke of Ormond, Lord Lieutenant of Ire- 
land. This insurrection he joined and became its leader ; but 
it was discovered on the very eve of execution, and was rend- 
ered futile. 

Blood, who was neither afraid of man or devil, escaped the 
gallows, the fate of some of his associates, and concealing him- 
self among the native Irish patriots in the mountains, and ulti- 
mately he escaped to Holland, where he was favorable received 
by Admiral do Ruyter, the Dutch Nelson. 

Always ready for battle and spoil, we next find him engaged 
with the Covenanters in their rel)ellion in Scotland in 1666, 
when being once more on the side of the losing party, lie saved 
his life only by stratagem. 

Thenceforward Col. Blood appears only in the light of a 
mere adventurer, bold and capable enough to do anything his 



202 TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 



a 



passions miglit instigate, and prepared to seize fortune where- 
ever lie might find her, without the slightest scruple as to the 
means employed. The death of his friends in the Irish insur- 
rection, seems to have left in Blood's mind a great thirst for 
personal vengeance on the Duke of Ormond, whom accordingly 
he seized on the night of December 6th, 1676, tied him on 
horseback to one of his associates, and but for the timely aid 
of the Duke's servant, would have hanged the astonished and 
paralyzed noble on Tyburn Tree, where he attempted to convey 
him. The plan failed, but so admirably had it been contrived 
that Blood remained totally unsuspected as its author, although 
a reward of one thousand pounds was offered by King Charles 
for the discovery of the attempted assassins. 

He now opcnpd to the same associates an equally daring but 
much more profitable scheme, had it been successful : to carry 
off the Crown Jewels. It was thus carried out — Blood one day 
came to see the Regalia, dressed as a parson, and accompanied 
by a woman whom he called his wife ; the latter professing to 
be suddenly taken ill, was invited by the keeper's wife into the 
adjoining apartment. Thus an intimacy was formed which 
was so well improved by Blood, that he arranged a match be- 
tween a nephew of his and the keeper's daughter, and a day 
was appointed for the young people to meet. At the ajjpointed 
hour came the pretended parson, the pretended nephew, and 
two others, armed with rapier blades in their canes, daggers 
and pocket pistols — a nice wedding party indeed. 

One of the number made some pretence for staying at the 
door as a watch, while the others passed into the Jewel house, 
the jjarson having expressed a desire that the Regalia should 
be shown to his friends, while they were waiting for the ap- 
proach of Mrs. Edwards, the keeper's wife, and her daughter. 
No sooner was the door closed than a cloak was thrown over 
the old man and a gag was forced into his mouth ; and thus 
secured they told him their object, telling him at the same time 
that he was safe if he kept quiet. The poor old man, hoAvever, 
faithful to the trust imposed in him, exerted himself to the 
utmost in spite of the blows they dealt him, till he was stabbed 



FAILURE TO GET A CROWN. 203 

and became senseless. Blood now slipped the Crown under his 
cloak, another secreted the Orb, and a third, with great in- 
dusty, was engaged in filing the Sceptre into two parts, when 
one of those coincidences, which a novelist would hardly dare 
to use, much less to invent, gave a new turn to the proceedings. 

The keeper's son, who had been in Flanders, returned at this 
critical moment. At the floor he was met by an accomjjlice, 
stationed there as a sentinel, who asked him with whom he 
would speak. Young Edwards replied, " I belong to the house," 
and hurried up stairs ; and the sentinel, I suppose, not knowing 
how to prevent the catastrophe he must have feared otherwise 
than by a warning to his friends, gave the alarm. 

A general flight ensued, amidst which the robbers heard the 
voice of the old keeper once more loudly shouting, ''Treason! 
murder," which, being heard by the young lady, who was wait- 
ing anxiously to see her lover, she ran out into the open air, 
reiterating the same cry. The alarm became general and out- 
stripped the conspirators. 

A warder first attempted to stop them, but being very fat, 
at the charge of a ])istol which was fired, he fell down without 
waiting to know if he was hurt, and so they passed his post. 
At the next door, Sill, a sentinel, not to be outdone in pru- 
dence, offered no opposition, and they passed the draw-bridge. 

At St. Katharine's Gate their horses were waiting for them; 
and as they ran along the Tower wharf they joined in the cry 
of " Stop the rogues," and so passed on unsuspected till Cai> 
tain Beckman, a brother-in-law of young Edwards, overtook 
the party. 

Blood fired a pistol but missed the Captain, and was imme- 
diately made prisoner. 

The Crown was found under his cloak, which, prisoner as he 
was, he would not yield without a struggle. 

" It was a gallant attempt, however unsuccessful," were the 
witty and ambitious fellow's first words ; " it was for a Crown !" 

Not the least extraordinary part of this affair was tlie sub- 
sequent treatment of Col. Blood. Whether it was that Blood 
had frightened Charles II, by his audacious threats of being 



204 TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 

revenged by his numerous associates, in case of his death on 
the scaffold, or else captivated him by his brilliant audacity 
and flattery combined, it is certain that Blood, instead of being 
punished as he should have been, was rewarded with place, 
power, and influence, at court. Instead of being sent to the 
gallows, he was taken into especial favor, and all applications 
through him to the King, for favors, were successful. 

It is said that Blood had told the King that he had been en- 
gaged to kill his Majesty, from among the reeds by the Thames' 
side, above where Battersea Bridge now spans the river, but 
was deterred from the crime by the air of Majesty which shone 
in the King's countenance. 

What more delicate flattery could be administered to a King 
than this ? 

Blood died peaceably in his bed in the year 1680. 

It was not to be expected that the notorious favoritism of 
the King toward Blood should escape satirical comment, and 
the Earl of Rochester, a shameless scoundrel himself, wrote, on 
the attempt to steal the Crown : 

" Blood, that wears treason in Lis face, 
Tillian complete in parson's gown, 
How much he is at Court in grace 
For stealing Ormond and the Crown ! 
Since loyalty does no man good 
Let's steal the King, and outdo Blood." 

Edwards and his son were awarded ^300 by a not over gen- 
erous Parliament, l)ut the delay in payment of the sum was 
such that Mr. Edwards was compelled to sell his claim for 
<£120 to a Jew. In this case virtue had its own rcwai'd, but 
no other. 

On the neighboring Tower Hill, which is now covered by 
fme mansions, and where the shaft has just been sunk, giving 
admission to the Thames Subway under the River, in the old 
days of violence and blood, many a noble head was brought to 
be hewed off by the executioner's shining axe. Lady Raleigh 
lived here on Tower Hill after she had been forbidden to visit 
her husband in the Tower. William Penn was born in a little 
old house in a little old dusty court on Tower Hill, and it was 



RIRTH-PLACE OF WILLIAM PENN. 205 

here that he first imbibed his horror of bloodshed and capital 
punishment. At the "Bull," a public house on Tower Hill, 
on April 14, 1685, died Otway the poet, of starvation, and 
around the corner in a cutler's shop, which is numbered with 
the things that were, Felton bought a large jack-knife for ten- 
pence, with which he assassinated the magnificent Duke of 
Buckingham. At No. 48 Great Tower street, is situated the 
Tavern called the " Czar's Head," built on the site of an old 
pot-house, in which the Emperor Peter the Great, and some low 
companions, used to meet to drink fiery potations of brandy 
and smoke clay pipes. 

In the very same spot, where the scaffold was formerly 
erected, and where the gouts of blood fell dripping from the 
severed necks of victims of the axe, marine stores are now 
sold, and sea-biscuits, pea-jackets, hour-glasses, and quadrants 
are offered for sale. 

The scaffold was generally built on four strong posts with a 
platform, five feet high, and in the centre of the platform 
was placed the block. The victim was generally bound, unless 
by desire the binding was omitted. 

For the gratification of those curious in such matters, it may 
be as well to give the bloody head roll of the most illustrious 
of the victims executed on Tower Hill, and the date of their 
decapitation. 

June 22, 1535, Bishop Fisher; July 6, 1535, Sir Thomas 
Moore ; July 28, 1540, Cromwell, Earl of Essex ; May 27, 1541, 
Margaret Pole, Countess of Shrewsbury ; Jan. 20, 1547, Earl 
of Surrey, the poet ; March 20, 1549, Thomas Lord Seymour, 
of Sudeley, by order of his brother, the Protector Somerset, 
who was beheaded Jan. 22, 1552 ; Feb. 12, 1553-4, Lord Guild- 
ford Dudley; April 11, 1554, Sir Thomas Wyatt; May 12, 
1641, Earl of Strafford ; Jan. 10, 1644-5, Archbishop Laud ; 
Dec. 29, 1680, Wilham Viscount Stafford, " insisting on his 
innocence to the very last ;" Dec. 7, 1683, Algernon Sydney ; 
July 15, 1685, the Duke of Monmouth ; Feb. 24, 1716, Earl of 
Derwentwater and Lord Kenmuir ; Aug. 18, 1746, Lords Kil- 
marnock and Balmcrino ; Dec. 8, 1746, Mr. Radcliffe, who had 



206 



TOWER, PALACE, AND PRISON. 



been, with his brother. Lord Dcrwentwater, coimcted of treason 
in the Rebellion of 1715, when Derwentwater was executed ; 
but Radcliffe escaped, and was identified by the barber who, 
thirty-one years before, had shaved him in the Tower. JVIr. 
Chamberlain Clark, who died in 1831, aged 92, well remem- 
bered (his father then residing in the Minories) seeing the 
glittering of the executioner's axe in the sun as it fell upon Mr. 
Radcliffe's neck. April 9, 1747, Simon Lord Lovat, the last 
beheading in England, and the last execution upon Tower Hill, 
when a scaffolding, built near Barking-alley, fell with nearly 
1,000 persons on it, and twelve were killed. 





CHAPTER XIY. 

THE CADGERS OF LONDON BRIDGE. 

FTER leaving the Old Jewry Lane and pass- 
ing up Cheapside, we came into the Poultry 
just as the rain had ceased, and as great 
rifts in the masses of fog were breaking 
through the opaque atmosphere. The Poul- 
try is a short street which runs up to the 
Mansion House, and during the noon of the day is nearly im- 
passable from the amount of traffic done there. Now the shops 
were all closed, and the bell of St. Paul's rang out for midnight, 
the echoes stealing over the city and the river in a ghostly way 
that thrilled through the hearts of the pedestrians wlio were 
darkness-bound in the streets. We passed through the Poul- 
try into King William street, and on past Cannon street, with 
its warehouses and retail stores, by East Cheap, until we could 
see London Bridge, in all its vastness, looming up like a sleep- 
ing giant, the dark arches girding the river in seemingly ever- 
lasting bands. 

The detective said : " Let's go down the stairs of the bridge 
and see some of the characters that find board and lodging 
down the steps. They're a hawful set, some on 'em." 

The Thames lay at our feet, spread out like a map. The 
sky was clearing, and the river was very quiet. Now and then 
the sullen waters, driven in an eddy against the huge piers, 
could be heard plashing in a secret, stealthy manner, and anon 
they would recede and come back again, plash ! plash ! jjlash 1 
All about us was so still ; not a sound to be heard as we leaned 
over one of the alcoves in the bridge. Below us, to the left, 



208 THE CADGERS OF LONDON BRIDGE. 

the Catharine Docks, full of shipping ; the London Docks, full 
of shipjjing ; Shadwell lined with lighter craft — all so still, and 
tlic million of masts looking ghostly in the holy light of the 
midnight. Over on the right, Bermondsey-way, more shipping 
— countless spars pointing up to the midnight skies ; the Pool 
choked with shipping — coal barges, eel-boats, East India vessels, 
brigs and schooners, barks and black-hulled packets, lying high 
in the water ; flat-bottomed bai'ges for carrying sand and for 
dredging ; the gray coping stones of the Tower hanging over 
the water, and the stillness of death on noisy Rotherhithe, and 
a pall over the immense West India docks. 

This great river, this river of all the nations of the world, 
with their tributes laid at her docks and their gifts on her 
broad bosom — how quiet it is just now. A matchless stream 
for its congregated wealth. Miles of warehouses, miles of stone 
docks, miles of shipping, and thousands of seamen. And yet 
a dirty and turbid and ungrateful river at times, when it over- 
flows the fish-stalls, when it overflows the high street in Wap- 
ping and drowns myriads of rats in Upper and Lower Thames 
street. 

We went down the " London Stairs." Every bridge that 
spans the Thames has four stairs or flights of stone-steps run- 
ning down to the water's edge. These stone stairs are gener- 
ally twenty or twenty-five feet wide, and they run down, for a 
hundred broad, massive and capacious steps, to where the tide 
comes in. There are turns in the stairs, and stone platforms — 
where the magnificent stone embankment has not been com- 
pleted, as it is at Westminster Bridge down the river — under 
whose vast arches hundreds of human beings find shelter from 
tlie inclemency of the weather. I may say here that there is 
not such a city in the world as London for vagrancy and vaga- 
bondism of the worst kind despite the fact that there are 7,000 
l)olice in the metropolitan district ; and besides this force for 
jjrevention, the work-houses in the West District, composing 
Kensington, Fulham, Paddington, Chelsea, St. George's, Han- 
over Square, St. Margaret, and St. John, and Westminster, 
furnish in and out door relief to 18,000 persons. Marylebone, 



VAGRANCY AND PAUPERISM. 209 

Hampstead, St. Pancras, Islington, and Hackney, in the North 
District, provide for 24,820 persons. St. Giles, St. George, 
Bloouisbury, the Strand, Holborn, and City of London, in the 
Central District, provide for 19,127 persons. Shoreditch, Beth- 
nal Green, White-chapel, St. George in the East, Stepney, Mile 
End Town, and Poplar, provide for 28,713 persons, in the East 
District. In the Soutliern District, St. Saviour, Southwark, 
Rotherhithe, and Bermondsey ; in St. Olave's, Lambetli, Wands- 
worth, and Clapham, Cambcrwell, Greenwich, Woolwich, and 
Lewisham, there is provision for 38,487 persons. Here we 
have a total of 128,880 men, women, and children, occupants 
of the union work-houses of the metropolis of London, with a 
population of less than three and a half millions. Besides this 
number, tliere are thousands of casuals who receive lodgings 
in the work-houses ; and outside this fearful aggregate there 
are roaming in and about London at least 15,000 vagrants — or, 
as they would be called in America, " bummers " — who do not 
frequent the work-houses from various reasons, and conse- 
quently have to " bunk out," as we would call it in New York. 
At the bottom of some of the bridges there are heaps of rub- 
bish and old rotting planking, some of which rubbish is carried 
off when the tide leaves the stones of the bridges. Then there 
are old boat-houses, and rows of long, stout-built boats for hire ; 
but at nio'ht there are no persons to watch these boats, and 
they are used as berths to sleep in by the vagrant vagabonds 
who haunt the recesses of the bridges. When the tide recedes 
in the Thames, it generally leaves a space of twenty to two 
hundred feet of the inshore bottom of the river bare on the 
Surrey side, and this is generally a soft, drab-looking mud, witlt 
a treacherous look, where man or beast might be swallowed 
up without any warning. When the detective and I went down 
into the dark recesses of London Bridge, that night, the river 
was at the flood, and the rub])ish was being carried away by 
the incoming tide. This was on the Surrey side of the river. 
There were about a dozen persons beneath the first archway, 
making, in fact, a perfect gypsy encampment. Eight of these 
persons were of the male sex, and beside these there were two 



210 



THE CADGERS OF LONDON BRIDGE. 



old haggard-looking women and a grown girl of twenty years 
or thereabouts, and a child of ten years, in all the glory of rags 
and destitution. The oldest man in the party might have been 
fifty years of age, and the others were younger, one of them 
being a stout, able-bodied young fellow of eighteen or nineteen. 
Some of the party were asleep, and were snoring most com- 
fortably, as the rain did not penetrate to their place of sleeping ; 
but every few minutes a gust of wind came howling down the 
river and burst through the arches with a mad fury, making 
the sleepers turn uneasily on the stone steps. 




THE cadger's meal. 



The old fellow, who seemed to be a confirmed vagrant, from 
his slouchy look and greasy, unpatched clothes, had built a 
small fire of the refuse which abounded in the arches, and lie 
was drying pieces of driftwood that had floated from the scaf- 
folding on the new Blackfriar's Brid-e down the river. He 
was warming his hands and slapping them, and the little girl 



THE LOST GIRL. 211 

of ten years was stooped over the fire, toasting an enormous 
potato on the end of a splinter of wood. 

"What are you herding here for, Prindle," said the detect- 
ive to the old fellow, who looked up in a morose way and mut- 
tered something under his teeth which sounded like " D — n 
the bobbies." 

" I'm a trying to get somethink to heat. Vy vill yer foller 
a cove everywheres as wants to get a mouthful to heat, I haint 
done nothink as should bring you here arter me. I'm not hon 
the pad now hany more." 

" I don't want yer pertikler, I don't ; but stop yer jaw and 
keep a civil tongue in yer head, will ye," said the sergeant. 
" Whose gal is that ere a toasting the taty with the skiver ?" 

" I'm blessed hif I knows whose gal it his. Ye don't sup- 
pose that I'm the man as makes the Post-hoffice Di-rek-te-ree. 
She haint mine, I know, cos I'm not a fool, nor never vos, to 
have any children. I must say she is werry 'andy at the taties 
when a feller Avants to get some winks. But, I say, you got 
nothink aginst me from the Beak, 'ave you?" 

" No, I have nothing against you just at this partickler mo- 
ment, but I dunno how soon I'll have," said the sergeant. 
" But I have brought a gentleman here who wants to get some 
information about this 'ere precious family of yours, and how 
you contrive to live, and I want you to answer him civilly, or I 
may find something against you that would hurt your tender 
feelings, you know." 

" He Avants some hinformation habout me and my family, 
does he ? That's a precious lark, that is. Why doesn't he stay 
in his bleeding bed and cover his nose hup in the sheets. I 
never asked 'im about his familee, as I knows on. Wot a 
werry pecoolier taste he has, to be sure. Maybe he's one of 
them rummaging Paper chaps as is halways a torkin about the 
rights and dooties of the vorkin' classes, and is a-ruinin' of 
the country's blessed prosperity ?" 

" Father, answer the man civilly, will ye. Yer halways a- 
making trouble for yourself by yer bad tongue, and it docs 



212 THP" CADGERS OF LONDON BRIDGE. 

other people harm as well as yourself. Tell him wot you have 
got to tell, and he'll go away." 

This was said by the young girl, who now came forward and 
stood looking at the old man eagerly. She was robed in an 
old calico gown, rather tattered at the bottom, and quite be- 
smirclied with the washings of the Thames mud Avhich had 
clung to the stone stairs of the bridge. The girl was well 
formed and tall, and her dress hung from a good figure. Her 
eyes were black and glittering, and her bold, coarse, handsome 
face was seared witli the traces of evil passions, hardship, and 
reckless despair. The girl's face told her story before she had 
spoken. Cliildhood and girlhood reeking with the foulness of 
the gutters, and then the matured woman a castaway in the 
deadly miasma of the London slums. 

" There, aint that a precious daughter for a loving father like 
me. Oh, she's a comfort to me in me hold hage, so she is. 
And she talks of wirtuc and gets on the 'igh 'orse with her 
poor old father sometimes, and makes him veep. Oh, vot an 
ungrateful family I've got, to be sure. She's no better than 
she ought to be, anyhow." 

" Oh, stop that bloody talk, old man," said the stout, able- 
bodied young fellow, who seemed to be a person of influence 
in the out-door establishment. " Wats the use of throwin' 
sich things in the gal's face. Molly's a gal jest like any one 
else's gal when she can't get anything to eat. I don't blame 
her a bit." 

"If I am bad, Jem," burst out the girl, raging with passion, 
and her eyes filled with tears, " who made me so ? Who kept 
chiming into my ears that I had a pretty face and that I ought 
to sell it? Who, I say? Who was it," continued tlie girl, 
clenching her hands, and her face blazing with excitement, 
" that struck me last Christmas night, come two years, and 
pitched me out of tlie hole that we lived in on Saffron Hill ? 
And then I had to seek a livin' in tlie streets, and when I was 
hungry I took money and sold myself to perdition ; and then 
I had a father who used to steal it from me when I'd come 
home to sleep, and he'd take the few shillings that I earned by my 



THE YOUNG CADGER'S ST0R\- 213 

shame, to go and drink it, and none of ye were ashamed to 
live on the money that lost my poor soul. Not one of ye." 
Here the girl, utterly exhausted, sat down on the stones and 
wept as if her heart was going to break, while the ragged child, 
who had by this time succeeded in burning her fingers a num- 
ber of times, looked on in wonder at the sudden turmoil of 
vagabondism. The son, a powerfully built fellow, looked up 
and said : 

" Molly, I wish your devilish trap ud shut. Wot good does 
this do any of ye, I'd like to know. Here I've been hon the 
aggrawatin' tramp for two weeks, and I hexpectcd to see yes 
all comfortable like, when I kum home, in Saffron Hill, down 
St. Giles way, and here I finds yes hall a-living hunder London 
Bridge by night, and a-beggin, or doin' wuss, in the day time. 
Hits enuff to make a saint swear at his blessed liver." 

" Wuss luck, Jem ; wuss luck, Jem ; I halways knew as how 
it would come to this, a- sooner or a-later," said an old crone 
in the corner of the archway, who was smoking a pipe and 
whom I believed to be fast asleep. 

" Well, sir, if ye'v got no hobjection," said the stout young 
man, " I'll tell you our story. It isn't much of a story to tell, 
after all. The old man tliere went to be a navvy and got two 
shillings a day until he took to drink ; when he had work on 
the Great Western. Tliey used to swindle him in the Tommy 
shops. Them's the shops, you see, where a contractor wlio 'as 
the job to bulk it, keeps the groceries and grub for the navvies. 
They skin the navvies so terribly, do these Tommy shops, and 
when his week is up, a man has nothing left out of his vages, 
cos', you see, they halways manages to run up the bill as high 
as the week's vages. Oh ! they are precious scoundrels !" 

" Don't call them scoundrels, Jem. Hit's too good a name 
for them haltogether," said the old man, who was beginning to 
doze. 

" Will you shut up ?" savagely said the hopeful son ; and 
then he continued, when he had taken a wliiff at tlie pipe: 
" Well, by and by the old man got to drinking so nnich beer 
that the whole of the wages was drawn for lush, and he had 



214 THE CADGERS OF LONDON BRIDGE. 

nothing to cat during the week excepting what the other men 
gave him for charity." 

" Hevery word of that's a lie, Jem. Wot a precious talent 
you have, to be sure, for habusin of your poor old fayther." 

" Will you vshut up, d — n you ?" said the dutiful son, who 
was fast losing his temper at being interrupted so often by his 
fond parent. '• I wos away at sea down on a Cardiff coaster, 
when the old man came home, and the gal, there, Molly, was 
a lace-maker, and wos making eight shillings a week, and the 
old woman used to make penny baskets to carry fish home from 
the markets, and she got, I suppose, as much as — how much 
did you make on them ere baskets, mother ?" 

" Two and sevenpence ha'penny a week, Jem, and some of 
the stuff wos rotten has an egg, Jem, and I halways had bad 
hies, Jem — you know I had — a-crying for you when you wos a 
blessed baby." 

" There, stop that bell-clapper of yours, will ye ? Yez are 
all crazy, I think. Well, the short and the long of it wos, that 
the old man came home and began to drink everything that he 
could put his hands on, and Molly lost her place because the 
old un tvou.'d come haround her place of business, in Totten- 
ham Court road, and lier hemployer as was said as 'ow he's 
blessed if he'd stand hit liany longer, 'aving such a drunken 
old Idoke a-comin around his shop ; and then the gal togk to 
the street, and she got two months in the Bridewell for wagrancy, 
and when she came hout she was wuss nor ever, and then the 
family got put hout cos' they could not pay the rent in Saffron 
Hill, four bob and a tanner a week ; and it all comes of that 
hold man a-drinking like a swine that we are here to-night 
hunder London Bridge." 

" How can you tell sich voppers, Jem, about yer poor old 
fayther ? Ven you was about two hinches 'igh I used to dandle 
ye hon me knee, and now look at yer hingratitude to the hau- 
thor of your beink." 

*" Guv us a taty, Jenny," said the son to the little girl, who 
was now engaged in pulling three or four from the dying embers 
of the fire ; and he snatched one and tore a piece out of it 



TWENTY-FIVE HUNDRED CADGERS. 



215 



eagerly, hot ashes and all. Just then a low steamer went 
past, with her red signal light shining like a huge glow-worm 
out upon the surface of the dark river, and as she went under 
the bridge her whistle shrieked out on the night air like a 
demon, and at the same moment the bell of St, Saviour's in 
South wark, on the Surrey side of the river, tolled in a brazen 
tone the hour of one o'clock, and Sergeant Scott suggested to 
me tliat wo might as well go about our business and leave the 
Cadgers to themselves. " Cadger" is a Cockney term for peo- 
ple who will not work and have no habitation, but go from one 
place to another, roaming loosely, picking up anything they 
can get, honestly if they can get it that way, and if not they 
will not hesitate to steal for a living, or beg when they find 
people charitable enough and willing to commiserate their su]> 
posed sufferings. 

There are about 2,500 of this class in and around London, 
continually changing their places of residence, and to this class 
the hopeful family under London Bridge belonged. 




14 



CHAPTER XV. 

THE LUNGS OF LONDON. 

HE Lungs of London, through which her 
large masses of population find respiration 
and ventilation, are her parks, gardens, 
and pleasure grounds. 

The city is admirably provided with these 
oases, which occur frequently in the great 
desert of brick and mortar. 
Nothing can be more grateful to the eye of the 
stranger sojourning in the English metropolis, than 
the frequent views which he encounters of smooth 
bits of lawn, upon which large numbers of sheej) 
browse peacefully; acres of flower beds, in the care 
of the most celebrated florists ; sheets of water in 
which nude bathers are disporting with perfect freedom; or 
long and wide expanses of green trees and shrubbery, enclosed 
by high iron railings, but free to all the citizens to enjoy and 
to hold forever. 

Beside the parks and gardens, London has an infinity of 
squares, commons, and crescents, which are surrounded by pri- 
vate residences and inclosed by railings and walls — such as 
Trafalgar Square (public), Bedford, Cavendish, St. George's, 
Grosvenor, Leicester, Soho, Bclgrave, Euston, Finsbury, Fitz- 
roy, Portman, Russell, Wellclose, Hanover, Brunswick, Eaton, 
Berkeley, Golden, Mecklenburg, Red Lion, Tavistock, and a 
great number of other squares which I do not now call to mind. 
The majority of these places have plots of grass and trees, with 




regent's and HYDE PARKS. 217 

fountains and flower-beds, varying in size from a quarter of an 
acre to three acres in extent. Then again others have not a 
blade of grass or a single shrub to dignify their lonely aridness, 
and the hum of cartwheels and the noise of brawling men and 
■women, are heard all day and into the night ascending from 
them. Half a dozen of them, like Belgrave, Grosvenor, and 
Berkeley Squares, are hemmed in on all sides by the gloomy 
and palatial dwellings of the governing class of England, who 
seek to absorb even a stray blade of grass, or the leaves of a 
scantily clothed tree, sooner than allow the poor and degraded 
to enjoy them. 

And so we have green spots, like Golden and Soho, and 
Wellclose Squares, exhibiting the various gradations from 
squalid poverty to shabljy gentility ; and in Belgrave and Gros- 
venor Squares we have all the indications of refinement, wealth, 
perfumery, silks, and satins, combined with a resolve which 
says to Golden and "Wellclose Squares, 

"You are of a different nature from us. We belong to a 
class which knows you not, and with whom you can never 
mingle — never. You are polluted and degraded. We are the 
salt of the earth. We lock the iron gates of our private squares, 
and you must not enter them ; and yet we have parks and pre- 
serves, and Swiss Chalets, and villas at Mentone and Rome, 
and spas at Hombourg and Baden." 

And accordingly and most dutifully misery shrinks by high 
iron walls in the heart of London, or at most will only peer 
furtively through the iron grating of Grosvenor and Belgrave 
Squares. 

But the public parks belong to the people, and by the people 
they are enjoyed most thoroughly. Children, old and young, 
gray-beard and adolescent, all flock to these parks ; and Re- 
gent's Park or Hyde Park, on a summer Sunday afternoon is 
a splendid sight, and a similar one cannot be obtained anywhere 
else but in Paris pleasure grounds, on a Sunday, and it was 
Paris that first taught London to respire through these public 
lungs of hers. 



218 



THE LUNGS OF LONDON. 



The dimensions of the public parks and gardens of London 
are as follows : 



Battersea Park, . - - 

Kensington Gardens, 
Finsbury Park (in progress), 
Green Park, - . - 

Regent's Park, . . - 

Victoria Park, . . - 

Primrose Hill Park (Cricket Grounds), 
St. James Park, - - - 

Hyde Park, - - - - 

Southwark Park (not completed), 
Kensington Oval, (for Cricket Ground), 
Cremorne Garden, 
Botanic Garden, Chelsea, 
Eoyal Botanic Garden (Regent's Park), 
Horticultural Gardens (Cheswick), 
Kew (iardcns, _ _ . 

Buckingham Palace Gardens, 
Temple Gardens, - - - 

Zoological Gardens, - - - 

Greenwich Park, - _ _ 

Richmond Park, - - _ 



200 


acres. 


380 


(( 


300 


a 


71 


a 


450 


u 


■ 290 


« 


50 


u 


83 


u 


3D5 


« 


120 


a 


12 


ii 


10 


(( 


12 


« 


20 


(( 


35 


a 


CO 


a 


40 


a 


7 


11 


18 


li 


200 


li 


2,253 


« 



5,006 " 



Here are five thousand acres of parks, pleasure grounds, 
gardens, and cricket fields, all in fine order, and under careful 
and economical supervision. Surely London is well provided 
for in the way of open air amusement. Besides, bands play 
in the different parks and squares almost daily. In St. James 
Park, Regent's Park, and Hyde Park, bands play every after- 
noon in inclosures set apart for that purpose. Some of these 
bands are formed of old musicians and veterans who have 
served in the Crimean and Lidian wars. There is a body of 
men distributed over London, who wear a uniform of semi-mil- 
itary fashion, and are called the " Corps of Commissionaires," 
who can be sent on errands, with or for packages or letters, and 
from this body two full bands have been formed, who earn 
a decent subsistence by playing in St. James Park and Re- 
gent's Park, every pleasant afternoon during summer. 



WHAT THE PARKS CONTAIN. 



219 



In the inclosiires, where tliese bands furnish music, chairs 
are arranged, and all persons who enter and take seats arc ex- 
pected to contribute two-pence toward the musicians for the 
pleasure of hearing the music. 




BATHING IN HYDE PARK. 

There are also sheets of water in Regent's Park, Victoria 
Park, Battersea Park, St. James' Park, and Kensington Gar- 
dens. The sheet of water, or stream, in Hyde Park, is known 
as the " Serpentine River," from its sinuous course. This is 
quite a large sheet of water, and is much frequented for free 
bathing, on warm days in the heated term. Here, thousands 
of people may be seen on a sultry afternoon, plunging to and 
fro in the cool waters, and in case of any accident — for the water 
is deejD — the boats, ropes and drags of the Royal Humane So- 
ciety's Life Saving Apparatus, are always ready for immediate 
use, and numbers of people are rescued and taken from the 
Serpentine, and resuscitated. 

When the winter months come, and the Serpentine becomes 



220 THE LUNGS OF LONDON. 

frozen over, the Londoners congregate there in great numbers 
to skate, or play at golf or curling. 

There is a large lake in the Regent's Park ornamented with 
small, -svcll-wooded islands, and in Kensington Gardens there 
is one of the finest museums of art, science, and curiosities, in 
the world. There are rocky dells, and grounds for sham fights, 
in Hyde Park, there are the rarest exotics in the Palm House 
at Kew, and every known species of bird, beast, reptile, and, 
fowl, may be found in the Zoological Gardens, which comprises 
eighteen acres of space in the Regent's Park. 

In Richmond Park, wliich is ten miles distant from the Lon- 
don Post Office Centre, there are two thousand three hundred 
acres of hill, dale, plain, and forest, and here are to be found 
deer-parks, rabbit warrens, romantic foot-paths, ancient oaks, 
horse-chestnuts, and thorny ridges, with a variety of sequestered 
spots for pic-nics and pleasure parties. This noble park can 
be reached by a sail of fifteen miles on the River Thames, 
which is skirted by Richmond Park for some distance. 

There is a grand Observatory for scientific purposes in Green- 
wich Park, which is noted all the world over for its correct 
calculations, and all the watches and clocks in Great Britain 
are set by Greenwich time. 

Bushy Park, at Hampton Court, where there is a splendid 
gallery of ancient and foreign paintings and sculpture, the 
property of the nation, and free to the people, was formerly the 
residence of Cardinal Wolsey. This royal palace and park is 
to London what St. Cloud is to Paris. The palace stands on 
the banks of the Thames, and when completed, in 1526, for the 
great Cardinal, it contained 282 apartments, and as many beds. 
The Great Hall is inferior to none in England, and is orna- 
mented with stained-glass windows, stags' heads, spears, flags, 
trophies, figures of men-at-arms, and other medieval ornaments, 
and the walls are hung with tapestry, depicting the story of 
the Patriarch Abraham's life. The largest grape-vine in the 
world grows in the park, and extends over a space of 3,000 
feet. Tliis vine was planted one hundred years ago, and pro- 
duces, every year, about 2,000 bunches of black, sweet grapes, 



THE world's fair. 



221 



which are reserved for the Queen's private table. An attend- 
ant, showing the royal vine to me, informed the writer that it was 
high treason to steal the grapes, and I have no doubt that he be- 
lieved what he said. The Queen has, also, a bed-room here, 
which she wisely refrains from sleeping in, as, I have no doubt, 
she would catch influenza from the draughts. 

But the great curiosity of Hampton Court Park, is the 
" Maze," an intricate complication of pathways, that wind in 
and out, and which have served as a standing conundrum and 
riddle from time immemorial, for the amusement of the Cock- 
neys. Any one who enters this maze without a guide cannot leave 
it again, so intricate and puzzling are tlie foot-paths, which are 
overshadowed, embowered, and interlaced with young trees and 
umbrageous shrubbery. By fastidious Londoners this maze is 
called the " Labyrinth." 




THE LABYRINTH. 



One of the most popular places of rural resort in the vicinity 
of London, is the Crystal Palace at Sydenham, a suburb of the 
metropolis, and about ten miles from the city. 

It is no exaggeration to say, that next to St. Peter's, at Rome, 
this is the most wonderful structure in the world, and equals 
in point of magnificence, some of the creations of the Arabian 
Nights. 

When the great World's Fair of 1851 ended, there was a 
general desire among all Englishmen, that this magnificent 
structure, which had held the great cosmopolitan show, should 
not be destroyed. A committee of some nine gentlemen was 
formed, by whose direction it was taken to pieces for the pur- 



222 THE LUxNGS OF LONDON, 

pose of reconstruction. This committee had purchased the 
building, and a company was chartered with a capital of <£500,- 
000, in shares of £5, and so confident were the Londoners of 
the success of the new scheme, that the shares were quickly- 
taken up and the operation of removing the vast building to 
Sydenham, its ])rcsent site, was commenced. 

The new structure was begun, and the first column raised, 
on the 5th of August, 1852 ; and, immediately after, several 
gentlemen were despatched to the principal cities on the Con- 
tinent for the purpose of bringing to England casts of the finest 
pieces of sculpture in existence, and other specimens of the fine 
arts. The splendid Park, Winter Garden, and Conservatories 
were committed to the management of the late Sir Joseph 
Paxton, who invented the architectural part of the Palace of 
1851. The arrangements of the various other departments 
were assigned to men of eminence and skill, in whose hands 
the structure grew, until it quickly attained its present splen- 
dor, and the New Crystal Palace was at length opened to the 
public on the 10th of June, 1854. Some idea of the magnitude 
and extent of the operations carried on in the fitting up of this 
enormous house of glass may be gathered from the fact, that 
at one time there were no fewer than 6,400 men employed in 
carrying out the designs of the directors. The edifice is com- 
pletely transparent, being composed entirely, roof and walls, 
of clear glass, supported by an iron frame-work ; and it is said 
that these materials are more durable than either marble or 
granite, and, if properly cared for, will utterly defy the ravages 
of time. The extreme length of the Palace, including the 
wings, is 2,756 feet; which, with the colonnade leading from 
the railway-station to the wings, gives a total length of 3,476 
feet, or nearly three-quarters of a mile. The width of the great 
central transept is 120 feet ; and its height, from the garden front 
to the top of the louvre, is 208 feet, or six feet higher than the 
Monument on Fish Hill. It consists of a basement floor, above 
which rise a magnificent central nave, two side-aisles, two main 
galleries, three transepts, and two wings. In order to avoid same- 
ness and monotony in such an immense surface of glass, pairs 



THE CRYSTAL PALACE. 



223 



of columns and girders are advanced eight feet into the nave 
at every seventy-two feet. An arched roof covers the nave, 
and the centre transept towers into the air in fairy-like light- 
ness and brilliancy. There are also recesses twenty-four feet 
deep in the garden fronts of all the transepts, which throw fine 
shadows, and relieve the continuous surface of the plain glass 
walls; and the whole building is otherwise agreeably broken 




TUE CKYSIAL I'ALACE. 



into parts by the low square towers at the junction of the nave 
and transepts, the open galleries toward the garden front, and 
the long wings on either side. The building is heated to the 
genial temiDerature of Madeira, by an elaborate system of hot- 
water pipes, and the supply of water is drawn from an Artesian 
I well. The Tropical Department, once a great feature of the 
Palace, has ceased to exist ; having been dcstroj'ed by fire 
about three years ago. 

There are large and beautiful pleasure grounds all around 
the Crystal Palace, and all the great national fetes, concerts, 




224 THE LUNGS OP LONDON. 

and open air demonstrations, take place here. Patti, Nillson, and 
Sims Reeves, sing here in benefits for charitable associations, 
and for a shilling, a person may listen to ballads on Saturday 
afternoons, at these concerts, sung by the greatest living Eng- 
lish tenor. Then there are acres of restaurants and dining 
saloons inside and outside of the Crystal Palace, and appai-atus 
and cooking utensils are on the premises, whereby ten thou- 
sand people may find dinner, all at one time, and sit down to 
tables in five minutes after dinner has been ordered. During 
the long summer evenings, promenade concerts are held at the 
Crystal Palace, and fire-works are let off in the presence of 
great crowds, who enjoy the sports and junketings much as a 
New York crowd may do on a Fourth of July night, in the 
City Hall, or Madison Park. 

The contents of the Palace itself are calculated to puzzle the 
brains of a philosopher. Everything wonderful, curious, pre- 
cious, or difficult to find at any other other place, may be found 
at the Crystal Palace. 

Specimens of architecture, sculpture of all ages, tombs, tem- 
ples, Ijusts, statues, capitals, hieroglyphs, from Greece, 
Rome, Egypt, and Italy, portions and entire courts from the 
glorious Alhambra, gigantic relics and ruins from the Palaces 
of Ba1)ylon, Susa, and Nineveh ; fragments of the Christian 
temples of Italy, the castles and churches of Germany, the 
Chateaux of Belgium and France, and the Cathedrals and Man- 
sions of England, from the earliest ages to the present time, all 
of which are arranged in "courts" in the most systematic 
order. 

Beside these there are many Industrial "Courts" contain- 
ing Ihe most wonderful and useful inventions of the genius 
and scholar. Then there are gigantic models of tlie tremen- 
dous animals who existed before the flood, with models of huge 
and hideous reptiles, and saurians, who did their level best in 
the same period. 

Some sunny Saturdays as many as fifty thousand people pay 
visits to the Crystal Palace, and to see and enjoy all these won- 



COST OF GROUNDS AND BUILDING. 



225 



ders, the charge is only one shilling, including concerts, music, 
fire-works, and flirtations. 

The last time I was there it was on the occasion of the Royal 
Dramatic Fete, for the benefit of the profession, and fully a 
hundred thousand persons were present, including the Prince 
and Princess of Wales, and many of the nobility. 

The entire cost of grounds and building, with works of art and 
curiosities, was seven million dollars. There were 15,000,000 
of bricks, 6,000 tons of iron, 20,000 loads of timber, 300,000 
superficial feet of glass, 1,200 iron columns, one mile and a 
half of clerstory windows, and other materials in proportion, 
used in the construction of the edifice, and the space of ground 
enclosed under the transparent roof is twenty-five acres, being 
one-fifth greater than the area of the base of the Great Pyramid. 



k 




&^\%^ -'^^^^ 




CHAPTER XVL 

THE RAKES OF THE ROYAL FAMILY. 

'NGLAND has been singularly unfortunate in 
her Royal Families. 

York and Lancaster, Plantagcnet and Tu- 
dor, Stuarts or Hanoverians, tliey have been, 
with here and there an odd exception, a very 
^S bad lot, morally speaking. 

It is a curious history of crime and blood- 
shed, of dislionor, perjury, and harlotry, this history of the 
Monarchs of England, since the days of William the Norman, 
who had three illegitimate children, and massacred thousands 
of his Saxon subjects every year, down to the days of George 
IV, the most gentlemanly blackguard of his time and of 
Europe. 

Roll back the hoary gates of the past, and look at Richard 
Crookback, who reveled in blood, and died in Boswortli Ditch, 
a death only a little better than that of Edward IV, whose 
children Richard basely murdered, and we find succeeding him 
a scoundrel like the Eighth Henry, a brutal fiend, with his six 
successive wives, all of whom perished miserably, but the first 
and last wives, Catharine of Arragon and Catharine Parr ; and 
then we find his two children — Mary, an honest fanatic, burn- 
ing human beings for the honor of God ; and next comes 
Elizabeth, who has been facetiously styled the Virgin Queen — 
with her paramours and favorites. Follow this liideous old 
spinster to the yawning verge of the tomb, and she is still to 
be seen with her parchment visage and grey hairs, seeking new 



VAGABONDS IN KINGLY ROBES. 227 

lovers, or butchering the unfortunate Queen of Scots, until at last 
the dread moment of all approaches, when she tells her horri- 
fied chaplain that she will give millions of money for a moment 
of time. Then we have a pusillanimous monarch, James I, 
who spends his best years discovering ^vitches and writing fan- 
tastical and forgotten treatises against tobacco, or permitting 
a man like Bacon — whose life was worth that of a thousand 
Kings, to be degraded and made miserable, till at last his great, 
far seeing eyes are closed in a final sleep — his heart having 
broken to pieces in the meridian of his genius. 

Then comes Charles I, a good man in his mild way, a patron 
of the arts, a good husband and father, but withal he is doom- 
ed to the block. 

Yainly he endeavors, in battle and statecraft, to stem the 
onward march of the people who are determined to hurl all 
obstacles from their path which stand in the way of their new 
ideas. 

And now comes up the Brewer, Oliver Cromwell, one of 
Carlyle's heroes, (and by the way, all of Carlyle's heroes are 
dripping with blood,) a most accomplished and unrelenting 
butcher, one who thanks God for his "precious mercies" when 
a thousand men, women, and children are driven over a bridge 
into a deep river beneath, impelled by the pikes of his ruffianly 
soldiery. Then he dies, and Charles II, a dissolute royal scamp 
succeeds, and he of course has to dig up the crumbling skele- 
ton of Cromwell to hang it on Tyburn tree, that all men may 
see what manner of divinity it is that should hedge around a 
King. 

Think of this royal vagabond, who has for his mistress a 
Stewart, a Duchess of Cleveland, a Louise de Queroailles, who 
also becomes a Duchess of Portsmouth, and last but not least, 
poor simple, softhearted Mistress Nelly Gwynnc, who left to 
the nation Greenwich Hospital to atone for her lost soul. 

It might be expected that in these days of the daily news- 
papers and telegraph wires, of railroads, female suffrage and 
personal journalism, that royalty, and notably, English royalty. 



228 THE RAKES OF TUE ROYAL FAMILY. 



■ 



■would improve, from a slight sense of decency and a proper 
regard for public opinion, if for no other cause. Let us see. 

Ten years ago I vainly endeavored to penetrate the dense 
masses who lined Broadway, New York, and filled the air with 
their shouts, as an open barouche, containing the then Mayor 
of the chief city of America, sitting on the back seat, and a 
fair faced youth with flabby skin and retreating chin, clad in a 
scarlet uniform and having an Order of the Garter pendant 
from his breast, passed up the tlironged thoroughfare between 
two lines of citizen soldiery, whose bayonets, bright as silver, 
reflected back the many hues of the excited and surging 
masses. 

Five hundred thousand people of both sexes had turned out 
in holiday attire, that ever memorable day, to do honor to a 
foreign prince, whose government, since that thoughtless hour, 
sought during the terrible confusion of a civil war, by every 
means in its power, by money, influence, by Alabama pirates, 
by unceasing and bitterly hostile journalistic attacks, by speeches 
in and out of Parliament — through the pulpit and tlic rostrum, 
to destroy the Republic of the West. In fact that government 
moved Heaven and Earth to annihilate and obliterate the 
liberty, union, and might of the American people. 

Such a reception had not been given, twenty-five years be- 
fore, to the gallant, noble-minded, and chivalric Lafayette, the 
companion of George Washington, one of the finest characters 
in all history, or the unwritten records of mankind. 

This fair-faced, flabby-skinned youth, in the lobster colored 
and laced coat, who stood up in the open carriage, (hired from 
the New York Corporation hack-driver-in-chief, and charged for 
in the bill afterward rendered, at five times the real price,) was 
no less a personage than Albert Edward, Prince of W^ales, Duke 
of Cornwall, Fellow of Trinity House, Colonel of a Regiment 
of Foot, a General in the British Army, (like Captain Jinks,) 
Baron Renfrew, Duke of Rothesay, Earl of Dublin, and eldest 
son of Queen Victoria that is, and in the future to be King of 
England and Defender of the Faith, by the Grace of God and 
the permission of the Radical English Trades Unions. 



r 



A CHANGE FOR THE WORSE. 229 



He was not a very bad looking lad of nineteen or twenty, 
that sunny afternoon, as he bowed repeatedly and raised his 
Generals' chapeau, with its plume of feathers, and doffed it to 
the radiant republican female faces, and curtesied like a liack- 
ward school boy, in acknowledgement of the wild shouts which 
pealed upward in the clear atmosphere, although no spectator 
there could have accused him of having an intellectual or cul- 
tured face. How well we can all now remember, to our shame, 
the manner in which he was petted, and caressed, and toadied, 
and dined, and wined, until in the estimation of his toadies he 
had almost attained the stature of a God, this boy with the re- 
treating chin and imbecile face — this hope and pride of the 
Guelph family. 

Still with all the marked and inherent imbecility of a de- 
scendant of Gcoi'ge III in his features, the young scion of roy- 
alty had not, at that time when I first saw him, developed the 
seeds of immorality, want of honor, meanness, and utter sot- 
tishness wliich have since made his name infamous among his 
subjects, and despised by the princes of Europe. 

The young lad for whom America could not do too much 
honor in feteing and feasting, has since surrounded himself with 
pimps, panders, parasites, and blackguards, of the lowest kind. 

His name is a bye word of scorn in the British metropolis, 
and for a lady of rank or position to be seen three times in his 
neighborhood, is certain dishonor to her and her relatives. 

It was nearly ten years after that bright sunny day, in Broad- 
way, with its shouting multitudes and noisy cheers, bclbre I 
again saw His Royal Highness All)ert-Edward Prince of Wales. 

One night, in going through High Holborn, and being with- 
out any settled purpose as to where and how I should spend 
the evening, I accidentally noticed the blazing gas lamps of the 
" Casino," a well-known dancing hall, frequented by the loose 
livers and aristocratic idlers of the English Capital. 

After a moment's hesitation I entered and found the place — 
as is usual on summer evenings at all the London dancing 
halls — pretty well crowded. 



230 



THE RAKES OP THE ROYAL FAMILY. 



■ 



Scores of couples, of both sexes, were wliirling frantically in 
the Old-World Teutonic waltz, and in the flushed faces and 
excited gestures of the gyrating dancers I could notice a total 
forgetfulness of modesty and decorum. 

From the alcoves came the sounds of the clinking of wine- 
glasses, the rattle of Mo- 
selle bottles, the pop, pop, 
of champagne corks, and 
songs, choruses, and loud 
shouts of laughter, to- 
gether with a Babel-jab- 
ber of many confused 
tongues. 

My attention was at- 
tracted while listening to 
the music from the fine 
band, to a group that oc- 
cupied a position which 
|)artially screened them 
from the glances of the 
larger portion of the au- 
dience and dancers, sitting 
and standing back as they 
did in an alcove. 
There were a dozen persons, perhaps, in the party, of both 
sexes, five or six men fashionably attired, and as many women, 
in all the grandeur and magnificence of harlotry — open and 
defiant — l)ut well-bred harlotry. 

There were two central figures conversing in this group, and 
I could see that they were listened to with attention while 
speaking, one of them, particularly, a slightly bald-headed man, 
having secured the cars of his audience. 

The other central figure was a woman, beautiful, but of that 
beauty which is leprous to tlic siglit, and fatal to those wlio 
encounter it as the shade of tlic Upas Tree. 

"Who is that man ?" said I to an usher, nodding in the di- 
rection of the bald-headed person. 




I'RIN'CE OF WALES. 



THE PRINCE AND HIS FRIENDS. 231 

"That vian,''^ said the flunkey, "why, that's not a man, 
that's His Royal 'Ighness the Prince of Wales, — and long 
may he reign over us." 

And this worn, blase, sottish and almost brutally stupid-look- 
ing person in the Scotch tweed suit, with drooping eyelids 
and sore eyes, — as if he seldom went to bed, and then did not 
stay long in it, looking to be forty-five years of age ; prema- 
turely bald, and without a particle of that apparent divinity 
which, it is said, doth liedge a monarch, was the self-same 
young lad of twenty, whom I had seen environed by bayonets in 
Broadway, ten years before. 

But how changed he was ! Long nights of dissipation and 
debauchery had seamed the once youthful and unwrinkled 
features, and tlie under part of the face hung in heavy, adipose 
folds, like the dewlaps of a bullock. His figure was stout and 
without grace, and to me he seemed like a beer-drinking bag- 
man or commercial peddler, half John Bull, half Hanoverian. 
The tweed suit, a material which he affects very much, was 
not at all calculated to set off or adorn his figure, and the 
great grandson of George HI looked very undignified indeed as 
he leaned over (lie painted harlot resplendent in silks, and 
glistening with jewels, who is known to all wild London scape- 
graces, and young men about town, by the name of Mabel Gray, 
a name assumed for a purpose — to hide her identity with the 
gutters from wliich she has sprung. 

The Prince of Wales, despite all the counsels and admoni- 
tions of the Queen (of whom whatever may be said, tlie merit 
cannot be denied her of being a good mother), has, I regret to 
say, the reputation of being a very sorry scamp. 

His intimates are, generally, the worst and most aliandoncd 
roues of the Clubs, the lowest turf blackguards and swindlers, 
and when he chooses a companion who is not a swindler or a 
blackguard, a debauchee, or a decoy, he is sure to be a fool. 
H The young man standing by the side of the Prince of Wales 
when I entered the dancing hall, was Charles, Lord Caring- 
ton, wliose mother was of the great family of d' Eresby, the 
head of which is Lord Willoughby d' Eresby, Lord High Chara- 
15 



232 THE RAKES OP THE ROYAL FAMILY. 

berlaiii of England, to whom is entnisted the duty of looking 
after the morals of the English people and the sanctity of tlie 
British drama. It is he who gives passes to the House of 
Lords on Saturdays, on slips of blue paper which the unwashed 
are very eager to obtain ; and it is also the duty of the Lord 
High Chamberlain to watch every new burlesque Avhen pro- 
duced, in order that the skirts of the ballet girls and blondes 
may be of the proper length, and not too short for the pro- 
prieties. 

Lord Carington's grandfather was a rich man named Smith, 
who was ennobled for some reason or another, and his large for- 
tune and title has descended to the present possessor, who is 
known to be one of the wildest and most rakehelly young 
noblemen in London. He is a lieutenant in the Guards of the 
Queen's Household Brigade, and one of the boon companions 
of the Prince of Wales. The latter is constantly to be found in 
company with this " Charley Carington," as he is called, who 
was the perpetrator of a most cowardly outrage upon the 
person of Mr. Grenvillc Murray, an aged gentleman who was 
supposed to be proprietor and editor of the " Queen's Messen- 
ger," a satirical weekly journal, in which Mr. Murray was said 
to have written several scathing articles upon the " Hereditary 
Legislators " of England. In one of these articles a sketch 
was given of Lord Carington, under the title of " Bob Coach- 
ington, Lord Jarvey," in which the practice of driving a mail 
coach and four horses to and fro between London and its envi- 
rons and taking up passengers for money, a favorite pastime 
of Lord Carington, was referred to in no very flattering terms. 
For this supposed affront, without any positive proof to war- 
rant the outrage, the gallant Lord Carington, aged 25 years, 
set upon Mr. Murray, as he was coming out of the Conservative 
Club, of wliich he was a member, and beat him badly. Mr. 
Murray is about 60 years of age, and was of course not able to 
defend himself, and when he sought justice in the usual way 
at the Marlborough Street Police Station, of the magistrate, 
Mr. Knox, he found the Prince of "Wales and a number of 
titled ruffians sitting on the bench along side of the dispenser 
of justice ! 



TWO IMBECILES. 233 

Of course Mr. Murray received no justice in that Court, and 
not only was he refused satisfaction, but in addition an attack 
was made upon the person of liis counsel, when a libel suit had 
been preferred against the " Queen's Messenger," by the aris- 
tocratic friends of Lord Caringtoii and the Prince of Wales, 
who did this to intimidate him from writing farther in his 
journal of the scandalous conduct of the Queen's relations 
and the rottenness of the higher nobility. 

In addition to this Mr. Murray was expelled from the Con- 
servative Club by a ballot of one hundred and ninety votes, 
only ten members of the Club having the personal courage to 
withstand the influence and threats brought to bear against 
them by the Prince of "Wales, Lord Carington, and their minor 
satellites. 

Lord Carington is fond of driving his coach and four and 
taking up passengers in the outskirts of London, charging 
them a nominal fare. While sitting on the box or seat of the 
coach he usually holds to his lips a huge horn, which he toots 
like a raving maniac, much to his own satisfaction and the ed- 
ification of the floating community, who with the fondness of 
all Englishmen for a live Lord, smile benignantly if not affec- 
tionately upon this imbecile young nobleman. 

In the words of the song, the " Prince of Wales goes every- 
where to see the sights of town " -with Carington, and at the 
Dramatic fete at the Crystal Palace in 1869, while his beau- 
tiful, good, and neglected wife sat on a dais and received the 
donations for the Dramatic College, the Prince manifested in 
public his intimacy with Carington by laughing and conversing 
with him, arm-in-arm, much to the horror of all the pious 
old dowagers who were present and had heard wild stories of 
Lord Carington. 

Mabel Grey, who has ruined scores of young aristocrats and 
brought them to beggary, is the reputed mistress of Lord Car- 
ington, and has made several visits with him to Paris, Baden, 
and other places on the Continent. It is said that he has already 
squandered twenty thousand pounds upon this well-bred harlot, 
and it is the current talk in London that the Prince of Wales 
has also been on terms of an improper intimacy with Mabel 



2C4 



THE RAKES OF THE ROYAL FAMILY. 



Grey. At all events he is not ashamed to be seen speaking 
to her in Casinos or addressing her in public places, and the 
dear Prince has on several occasions been seen drinking cham- 
pagne -with her in the music halls and dancing rooms of the 
English capital. This is a very bad business for a bald-headed 
father of five children. 




PRINCE AND CABMAN. 



The Prince of "Wales, with all his immense riches, is mean 
and very penurious in money matters. He will argue for fif- 
teen minutes with a cabman in the street about an over-charge 
of a sixpence, and has been known to get into an altercation 
with ticket sellers in the box offices of places of amusement 
for the sake of a shilling or half a crown, in a most undigni- 
fied way. One night when getting out of a cab at Cremorne 
the driver attempted to charge the Prince four shillings for a 
ride when he should have charged him but two-and-sixpence. 
The Prince, who was a little intoxicated, refused to pay the 
over-charge. The London cabbies are the most imjmdent, 



INFAMY OF THE PRINCE. 235 

brassy set of fellows I ever saw, and this cabman was more than 
usually pugnacious. The Prince attempted to go into the 
Garden, and had presented his ticket, when the cabman with 
a yell clutched his coat, and tore away the skirt in the struggle 
to get more fare. The Prince was recognized by some of the 
attendants of the place, and the horrified cabman was lianded 
over to the police for assault on the blood royal. Fearing the 
ridicule of the London press, the Prince told the policeman 
to release poor Cabby, who was only too happy to escape trans- 
portation for life. 

For the past seven years the Prince of Wales has been a 
prominent actor in almost every scene of aristocratic dissipa- 
tion and debauchery which lias been enacted in the English 
metropolis. He is well known in the coulisses of the Opera, 
and has openly maintained scandalous relations with ballet 
dancers and chorus singers. Even the shame of the thing 
would not restrain him from loudly and familiarly applauding 
and clapping his hands, whenever any of these female favor- 
ites of his came on the stage, while the strains of Beethoven 
or Rossini could not elicit from him as much as a smile of 
gratified approbation. The taste of the Prince for music may 
be imagined from the fact that " Champagne Charley," and 
" Not for Joseph," are his two most cherished melodies. 

His relations with Mademoiselle Helena Schneider, the 
opera bouflfe singer, were most notorious, and he has been 
known to leave the bed side of his wife in her illness to hasten 
to Paris at the summons of this notorious woman of Darkness, 
and Sin, and Shame. 

Among his special female favorites, are many of the better 
known soubrettes of the London and Parisian theatres, and 
notably he was an admirer of Finette, tlie famous Can- can 
danseuse of the AUiambra. 

He is flippant, shallow, and heartless, and the record of his 
life thus far has caused many a scalding tear to fall fnsm the 
eyes of his royal mother. 

The London Lancet, the highest medical authority in Eng- 
land, found it necessary, some eighteen months ago, to deny the 



236 THE RAKES OF THE ROYAL FAMILY. 

charge that was made openly against the Prince, which if 
true, would stamp him with infamy. The Princess of Wales, 
who is a good and noble lady in every sense — and a long suf- 
fering one in some respects — during the summer of 1869, 
visited the baths of Wilbad, in Germany, for the benefit of her 
health, which had been sadly impaired. I dare not in these 
pages insult my readers by giving the cause of her ill-health, 
which is more than whispered about in English society. 

The Prince has, I believe, five handsome children — their 
good looks coming to them from their vigorous Norse mother, 
but it will not be from any precaution taken by their father, if 
they do not hereafter suffer from the results of liis early indis- 
cretions and follies, in the Haymarket and the purlieus of 
Paris. 

In a good many respects the Prince of Wales resembles an- 
other Prince of Wales — one who succeeded his father as King. 
I mean George IV. Like him, Albert Edward is already a 
broken debauchee, and like George IV Albert Edward has a 
yicious way of making his wife suffer through his follies and dis- 
graceful beliaviour. Unless the Prince is predestined to ex- 
perience a sudden and speedy conversion, it is more than prob- 
able that the next King of England will excel and put to 
shame the open acts of profligacy which made George IV so 
notorious. 

One thing could be said for George IV which cannot be said 
for the Prince of Wales. The former was a gentleman in man- 
ner if not one at heart — but this Prince, while being tlioroughly 
heartless and " stingy," has the breeding of a waiter in a lager 
beer saloon. He is heavy, slow, unready, hesitating, and flab- 
by, without a spark of culture or a trace of the refinement 
which belongs to his station. 

His Royal Highness has a great passion for running with the 
"masheen," as a New York rowdy would term it, and Captain 
Sluiw, of the London Fire Brigade, is greatly admired by the 
Prince for his gallant management of that very efficient Corps. 
The latter has often taken a ride on a fire engine through the Lon- 
don streets. The Prince, while on a visit to Brighton some years 



PRINCE AND BREWER AS FIREMEN. 237 

ago, made the acquaintance of a rich young London brewer, 
who had more money than brains. This was just the sort of a 
man to suit the Prince, being very fond of rich young men, 
who in many cases are only too happy to have the honor of 
paying the bills contracted by his Royal Highness. This emi- 
nent young brewer had, with the Prince, a similar taste for fire 
engines, and it was suggested by the future King of England 
that the brewer, who had a fund of good nature, should send 
to London for a fire engine, at his own expense, and have it 
transported to Brighton, where in course of time the Prince 
hoped it might afford them much amusement. The brewer of 
course complied with the Prince's request, and before long one of 
those grotesque looking fire machines, that are every now and 
then to be seen darting through the London streets, made its 
apjDcarance at Brighton. Night after night the Prince and the 
brewer made the quiet villas and the Parade of Brighton re- 
sound with their shrieks and howls, as they drove at headlong 
speed through the watering place, the two maniacs sitting astride 
of the apparatus which was drawn by two horses ; and finally 
the thing became such a nuisance to the residents of Brighton, 
and so many complaints reached the Queen's ears of the Prince's 
riotous conduct, that at last he was sent for and severely repri- 
manded by her Majesty, and for a few days he kept on his good 
behavior, to relapse again like a fever patient. 

It is useless to conjecture as to the probability of the Prince 
succeeding to the throne, but if ever he does, he will no doubt 
revive the days of Charles II and his dissolute court. His beau- 
tiful and virtuous wife will perhaps fall into the place Avhich 
Catharine, of Braganza, was compelled to accept as the consort 
of that rakehelly monarch, and Albert Edward will, no doubt, 
find in Lord Carington material for a successor to Sir Charles 
Sedley, and in the Duke of Hamilton a scamp, worthy of the 
reputation borne by the Earl of Rochester. 

It is a mistake to think, moreover, that the Prince of Wales 
is alone among his family, in his vicious course, or that he has 
not numerous imitators among the no})les bearing some of 
the proudest names in England. Although he is yet but a 



238 THE RAKES OF THE ROYAL FAMILY. 

young man of thirty years of age, he has those around him 
who ape liis immorahty and copy his disregard for the usages 
of society. 

Still, the Prince cannot be blamed for the follies of his rela- 
tions. The Duke of Cambridge, cousin to the Queen, and old 
enough to be tlie father of the Prince, has as bad if not a worse 
reputation, than the Prince of Wales. 

George Frederick William, Charles, Duke of Cambridge, 
Earl of Tipperary, and Baron of CuUoden, is a first cousin of 
Queen Victoria, a Field Marshal and Commander-in-Chief of 
the English Army. 

This Prince is about fifty years of age, and lives in an un- 
lawful way with a Miss Fairbrother, by whom he has had sev- 
eral children, I believe. It might be expected, of a prince so 
closely related to the Queen, and occupying such a high posi- 
tion as chief of the British Army, that he would set a good ex- 
ample to the younger branches of the royal family. On the 
contrary, the Duke is well known, everywhere, as a royal rake, 
and his shameless amours are beyond number. The old prince 
is slightly bald from his course of early piety, and suffers so 
dreadfully from the gout, the result of early dissipation, that he 
is nothing but a wreck, being compelled annually to pay a visit 
to the mineral baths of Germany, and American travelers upon 
the continent at Baden, Ems, and Hombourg, will occasionally 
encounter an old, broken, and bloated personage, limping on a 
stick, who will quarrel with a waiter, in Hanoverian Deutsch, 
for the sake of a kreutzer, and when once excited it is very 
difficult to calm his rage, which, sometimes, degenerates into 
a hel})less imbecility. This is the Duke of Cambridge. 

From his illicit connection with the lady to whom I have re- 
ferred, the mock-title of "Duke of Fairbrother," has been given 
to this illustrious Commander-in-Chief of the Army. Fancy such 
a Duke of Cambridge holding the baton of Wellington, and lead- 
ing such soldiers as Havelock, Outram, Colin Campbell, and 
Napier of Magdala. And this very same imbecile Duke has 
had command of the English Army, and notably at the Alma, 
in the Crimean campaign, his conduct was such as to make 



A MAD KING. 



239 



the spectators doubt whether he was a madman or a coward. 
In the heat of the fight, the Duke h)st all management of him 
self, and began to make strange noises, and to act in a strange 
manner, until he was carried from the field, kicking and biting 
in a maniacal fashion. 

For the taint is in the blood of the English Royal Family, 
and may never be eradicated. The Duke of Cambridge is a 
lineal descendant of George III, who, by his inherent madness, 
lost half of the British Empire, and who was in the habit of 
answering reasonable questions, with such replies as, — 

"What, what, who, who, where, where, why, why — BLIM!" 
Should the Prince of Wales hereafter behave himself in an 
unseemly fashion, his tainted blood may, to a certain extent, 
be blamed for the outbreak. 




' ^^o.-f^' 






CHAPTER XYII. 



FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 




HY Londoners slionld presume to sneer at the 
morality of the volatile Parisians, has always 
been a sore puzzle to me. During the past 
fifteen years, sharp observers of society in 
the English Capital have been appalled by 
the visible and marked progress of moral 
and social deterioration among the people 
who affect to give tone, and breeding, and refinement, to all 
that they do or say, as leaders of society. 

Polite London Society has always plumed itself upon being 
superior, in a moral sense, to the corresponding class in the 
French Capital, but it must strike those who have held such 
views, that there is no basis for the belief any longer, when the 
notorious fact is offered to them, that two of the highest per- 
sonages in England are men who lead lives of immorality — I 
refer to the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Cambridge. I 
have however said enough of those two loose gentlemen, and 
I shall proceed to consider the subject in its larger bearings. 

I boldly assert, that English Society, of the highest class, is 
to-day as rotten in every sense, as were the French nobility, 
with their mistresses and their "little establishments," before 
the whirlwind of the Revolution of 1793 swept away all that 
was of hideous corruption and infamy, never to rise again. 

Tlic proudest names among the English nobility are those 
which have some moral or dishonorable taint afiixcd to their 
titles, by their conduct in life. 



MISS HARRIET MONXRIEFFE. 241 

Many of my readers must recollect the termination of the 
famous Mordaunt case, in which the Prince of Wales was im- 
plicated, and it will also be remembered that the few facts 
which were developed on the trial, despite the attempt of Lord 
Penzance, (acting under pressure of the Throne,) to hush them 
up, had the effect of shaking England to the centre, socially 
speaking. 

Miss Harriet Sarah Moncrieffe, now Lady Mordaunt, is a 
daughter of Sir Thomas Moncrieffe, a baronet of one of the 
oldest families in Scotland. The family seat is at Earn, in 
Perthshire, and the mansion and grounds are among the finest 
in North Britain. The family was a large one, four sons and 
six daughters being born to Sir Thomas and his wife, who was 
a daughter of the Earl of Kinnoul. Lady Harriet's eldest 
sister is married to the Duke of Athole, one of the richest and 
most powerful of the Scotch nobles. Then she has a sister 
married to the Earl of Dudley, and another to a Mr. Forbes, of a 
wealthy Scotch family, into which, if I be not mistaken. Lady 
Douglas-Hamilton, a sister of the Duke of Hamilton, is married. 
One of the sisters — the Duchess of Athole, has for her mother- 
in-law the Dowager-Duchess of Athole — who is a tried and 
trusted friend of Queen Victoria, being, as I believe, a Lady- 
in-waiting, or a Lady-of-the-bcd-chamber to the Queen, or some- 
thing of that sort. Altogether the family and its connections 
are among the very thickest cream of English aristocratic 
society. 

In December, 1866, Lady Harriet Sarah Moncrieffe, then 
eighteen years of age, and surpassingly beautiful in person, and 
most graceful in manner, was married to Sir Charles Mordaunt, 
of Walton Hall, Warwickshire, who was then twenty-nine years 
of age, and a very wealthy bachelor, possessing one of the finest 
country seats, with mansion and grounds, in all England. The 
main buildings alone were erected at an expense of over 
$350,000 of American money, and to this most delightful and 
picturesque spot the young bride was taken to spend the honey- 
moon. Everything that the heart of a fashionably bred woman 
could desire was hers, she had troops of servants, a fine old 



242 FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

baronial mansion, a large stable full of horses, a yacht, a gal- 
lery of paintings, a villa on the Continent, equippagcs, dia- 
monds, ladies'-maids, and a town house in London. And be- 
side her lightest word was law to her loA'ing husband. She 
had been presented to the Queen, and in her life-pathway sun- 
shine fell and gladdened her young spirit. But there was a 
canker in the bud — a skeleton in the closet — as there always is. 
Lady Mordaunt had loved below her station before she married 
Sir Charles, and had sought to marry the object of her affec- 
tion, but her mother, who was a very worldly minded woman, 
was determined that she should marry the rich Sir Charles 
Mordaunt, who had houses and lands, while "poor Robin 
Adair" had to go about his business. 

Of course the natural consequences had to come. Sir Charles 
had a yacht, and now and then went on cruises to Norway and 
up the Baltic, and ran his craft from Erith to the Nore, and on 
naany a sunny day the snowy jib-sail of his boat was seen from 
afar by those nautical minded people who frequent the break- 
water at Cherbourg. When he was at home he was either 
hunting with the Warwickshire hounds, or looking for plover 
and grouse on Scotch moors. Any other spare time he had 
was taken up in his parliamentary duties, for he had the inef- 
fable honor of signing "M. P." after his name. 

And the young, gay, beautiful, and high spirited Lady Mor- 
daunt — how was it with her ? Being left very much alone, she 
developed herself. She delighted in balls, the Italian — yes, 
and the Bouffe Opera, she liked Croquet parties, garden parties. 
Crystal Palace concerts, and flirtations, and one evening, in 
company with Captain Farquhar, an officer of the Guards, she 
visited the " Alhambra," a celebrated dancing hall, which is 
supported by the London demi-monde. 

She was young, thoughtless, and very beautiful, and to be 
brief, she fell among wolves, as many a woman has before. 
She had for escort to different places, the Prince of Wales, Sir 
Frederick Johnstone, Viscount Cole (eldest son of the Earl of 
Enniskillen), Lord Newport, Captain Farquhar, the Marquis of 
Blandford, and among her acquaintances were the Duke of 



IN BAD COMPANY. 



243 



Hamilton, the Earl of Jersey, the Marquis of Waterford, and 
other young gentlemen, Avhose company or friendship alone 
would be enough to destroy the character of the most spotless 
married Avoman. And by the by, all these fast young noblemen 
are friends and boon companions of the Prince of Wales. 
Lady Mordaunt also knew Lord Carington, although his name 
did not appear in the trial for divorce. 

All of these titled gen- 
tlemen -whom I have 
mentioned, are of that 
class which is denomi- 
nated " fast young men" 
— in England. They arc 
all of good families, and 
are of the salt of the 
earth, being hereditary 
legislators for the Eng- 
lish people. They gam- 
ble, own fast horses, 
make tremendous bets, 
keep mistresses, and 
yachts, and among this 
set to dishonor a young 
and unsuspecting mar- 
ried woman, and cover 
with disgrace an old 
family name, is indeed 
an achievement of Avliich 
they feel very proud, a 

woman's weakr.ess and folly lieing a subject for joking in their 
clubs, and affording much amusement to the young blackguards 
at covert side and in many a yacht cruise in the Mediteranean 
and the Baltic Seas. 

Lady Mordaunt had fallen among a pack of masculine 
wolves. Her two sisters, the Duchess of Athole and the 
Countess of Dudley, vainly endeavored to save their foolish 
sister, and her mother. Lady Louisa !Moncrieffe, and her young 




LADY MORDAUNT. 



2i4: FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

sister, Avho -was engaged privately to Viscount Cole — ( Miss 
Frances Moncrieffe), and Miss Blanche Moncrieffe, used all 
their powers of persuasion, but Lady Mordaunt had met already 
with the fate of all those who frequent had company. She was 
corrupted, and her only desire was now to become deserving 
of the title of " fast." Lady Mordaunt soon became the leader 
of the " fast " feminine set in London. No lady could drive 
such " fast" ponies as she. None could equal her for " fast" 
or " slangy " talk. Her highly colored attire was voted the 
" fastest" in London. Her male companions who were in her 
company and who escorted her, were all " fast," particularly 
the Prince of Wales, who enjoys the proud distinction of being 
" fast." Lady Mordaunt never accompanied her husband 
anywhere — he being very often absent, and besides, he was 
not " fast." 

And Lady Mordaunt is not alone among her aristocratic sis- 
ters of London. She has a number of imitators, who talk 
"fast," ride "fast" horses, frequent the company of "fast" 
men, and visit with these last, " fast" places of amusement. 
This " fast " woman has now become typical in England. She 
dyes her hair, she paints her face, she wears flaunting and un- 
becoming costumes after the style of the loose living blondes 
who appear in burlesque ; in short, she apes the manners and 
the attire of that hapless class of women of whom she once 
spoke, when she spoke of them at all — with a shuddering thrill 
of mingled horror and pity. A famous female English novelist 
— whose heroines, by the way, are all of the light-hair-dye and 
" fast " type — speaking of these " fast " society-women, per- 
tinently asks : — 

" Who taught the girls of Englaud this hateful slang ? who showed them 
— nay, obtruded upon and paraded before them these odious women ? who, 
indeed, but the men, who recoil from their own work of their own hands, and 
cry out upon the consequences of their own conduct ? It was not till the 
young Englishman learned to ridicule everything virtuous as " spoony," and 
everything domestic as " slow," that the Avomen took pains to master the 
slang of the race-course, and to model their dress upon the costumes of the 
women whom they saw from their carriage Avindows dimly athwart the mists 
of midnight Hitting across the Ilaymarket, as they were driven away from the 



SLANG WOMEN AND " MRS. JOHNSON." 245 

Opera-house. Be sure society decayed, like the tree to wliich poor Swift 
pointed witli sad prophetic certainty, "/rst at top." It was not till the moral 
deterioration of the modern young man had become a fact but too obvious, 
that any fotal change was perceived in the modern young woman ; it was 
not until a contemptuous and disrespectful demeanor to parents, newly de- 
nominated governors, relieving-officers, paters, maters, maternals ; a scorn- 
ful avoidance of sisters as muffs and dowdies ; an utter irreverence for age, 
and a disdainful treatment of all woman kind, — had become distinc'uishi no- 
characteristics of young Mr. Bull, that poor, giddy, mistaken Miss Bull, too 
anxious to please the young cub, whose moral being and real interests had 
best been served by a judicious course of cat-o'-nine-tails, began to dye her 
pretty hair and paint her fresh young cheeks ; it was not till the British 
lords flocked to the sale of a bankrupt courtesan's effects, and gave unheard- 
of sums for the tawdry crockery-ware of a courtesan's bedchamber, that 
British ladies began to slide downwards upon that fatal incline wliich their 
masters had smoothed for them." 

" In the early days of the music-halls, before the nameless Captain had 
begun to cultivate his too flimous whiskers, or the insatiable thirst of tho 
convivial Charley had become a fact so painfully notorious, — when the pru- 
dent Joseph Avas yet unknown, and the Strand not yet renowned as the 
dweling-place of Nancy, — there was sung a song called " Mrs. Johnson," 
in which the singer, in a tipsy solemnity, bewailed the fact that the tastes 
and manners of his amiable wife were but too identical with his own. 
" And so does Mrs. Johnson," — that was the ever recurring refrain. " I 
drink, I smoke, I swear, I stop out to unholy hours of the night," sings this 
Mr. Johnson of the music-halls, " and so, unhappily, does Mrs. Johnson. I 
am altogether a fast and disreputable individual, and I consider it ver}'^ de- 
lightful to be fast and disreputable ; but — and here, I confess, the shoe 
pinches — so does ^Irs. Johnson. This midnight rioting, this hunting up of 
dancing-gardens and quaffing of perennial champagne, is my very ideal of 
man's existence : but I recoil aghast with horror before the idea of the same 
predilections in Mrs. Johnson." It is only a vulgar music-hall ditty; but I 
think there is a moral hanging to it, which our modern Juvenals would do 
well to consider " 

It is the story of Adam and Eve over again — " the woman tempted me, 
and I did eat." Tlie historian of the future, studying the social aspects of 
this century from a file of Saturda)/ Reviews, would have fair ground for 
believing it was because of modest women that outraged Englishmen fled to 
the denizens of St. John's-wood ; that it was the slang and fastness of our 
girls that drove our men to the race-course and the betting-ring; the Avomen 
tempted them. What cowards and hypocrites men must be, when they can 
turn upon and assail the helpless woman who has meekly and dutifully copied 
the model they have set up before her eyes, and at whose shrine she has 
seen them prostrate and worshipping I 



24G FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 



Mjj^l 



The modern young man, with a selfishness as short-sighted as — selfish- 
ness, which is always shortsighted, has desired all the delights of life. He 
likes the society of the venal Cynthia of the minute, as his forefathers have 
done before him, but it has seemed too him too much trouble to disguise that 
liking, in deference to the feelings of purer Cynthias, as his foreHithers did 
before him. When Junius wished to brand the Duke of Grafton with inef- 
fable shame, he charged him with having flaunted Miss Parsons before the 
ofiended eyes of royalty ; nowadays such a reproach would seem the emp- 
tiest oratorical truism. Tlie royalty of virtuous womanhood is ofiended every 
day by a procession of Miss Parsonses. Everywhere Miss Parsons is fol- 
lowed and worshipped. At covert-side, on parade of Brighton, or in lamplit 
fravdens of Scarborough, in opera-house and on race-course, abroad or at 
liomc — the Parsonian worship is still going on. ]Miss Parsons has her matins 
and her vespers, her choral services at five o'clock, her gatherings at all 
hours and all places. The bells are always pealing that call the faithful of 
the Parsonian creed. And woman's poor little stock of logic only enables 
her to frame one fatal syllogism : 

^liss Parsons is admired ; 

]\Iiss Parsons is beloved ; 

Therefore to be like Miss Parsons is to be admirable and loveable." 

When the season ended it was customary for Sir Charles 
Mordaunt to rejoin liis wife at Walton Hall, and it might have 
been believed that after the gaieties of the winter revels, the mis- 
tress of the mansion would seek a little rest and the quiet of the 
country. But no. The country seat was always full of " fast" 
ladies and " fast " gentlemen. Sporting men and people of 
loose characters, whom no scnsi))le man would admit to the 
presence of his wife, became the intimates of Lady Mordaunt. 
In fine, tlic Coles, Farquhars, Johnstones, Watcrfords, Ilam- 
iltons, and the like, were "doing Lady Mordaunt's business 
for her," as I heard a London barrister express it. People 
began to talk about her, and she lost the respect of her 
friends, who dropped off one by one. Her poor old father, Sir 
Thomas Moncrieffe, while sitting in White's Club (the only 
club of Avhicli the Prince of Wales is an active member), hears 
his daughter's name mentioned in a very odious manner, and 
that of the Prince of Wales occurs in the connection. The 
" Pwince," says one of these small wits, " is A'ery devoted — ah — 
Lady Mowdaant — I heah," and so the scandal flies. Sir 
Thomas is enraged, threatens the puppy, and tells Sir Charles 



A GIDDY WOMAN. 247 

of the thunder in the air. Poor old man ! It is openly stated 
in the club that Viscount Cole and Sir Frederick Johnstone, — 
the former twenty-two, and the latter thirty-two years of age, 
are constant visitors to her boudoir, — as often as three times 
in a day — so says Madame Scandal. Sir Frederick Johnstone 
is known to be the greatest libertine in England. He is 
rich, of a good family, and yet no woman will marry him, for 
it is whispered in society, — even among ladies — that he has 
become so enervated and palsied from his long course of de- 
bauchery, as to be unfit for the marriage bed — and Lord Cole 
is a fit rival to Lord Carington for wildness and blackguardism. 
I saw this same Sir Frederick Johnstone slapped in the face a 
dozen times at the Cremorne Gardens one night, by a fashion- 
ably attired Cyprian who had been his mistress, and wiio had 
been deserted by him, but not a blush warmed his cheek under 
the stinging slaps of her hand. Luxury and debauchery had 
emasculated him. He was no longer a man — he was a frame 
covered over by a handsome evening dress. 

During all this time, while Lady Mordaunt was sowing the wind 
to eventually reap the whirlwind, her husband was ignorant of 
these most damnatory facts against her reputation, — which after- 
ward became known to him. At last the scandal was bruited 
about so much that Sir Charles Mordaunt found it necessary to 
enter proceedings in the Divorce Court, at Westminster, for a 
separation from his wife. All England was, socially, turned 
upside down with amazement, when it was ascertained that 
the Prince of Wales was implicated. The Queen sent for Sir 
Charles, and begged of him to Avithdraw from the case, in order 
to secure her son's reputation from the contempt which was 
sure to fall upon his Royal Highness when the developments 
were made public. The entreaties of the Queen did not avail, 
however, with Sir Charles, whoT with a dogged English pluck, 
was resolved to have justice. Then an attempt was made to 
bribe him, and a peerage was offered him to keep him quiet, 
but this did not serve, as Sir Charles refused to compromise 
with dishonor and shame. 

Lady Mordaunt's husband had ordered her not to receive the 
16 



248 FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

Prince of Wales at his house wliile he was absent, or at any 
other time, but the unfortunate woman had disobeyed him. 
She also refused to accompany Sir Charles on a fishing excur- 
sion to Norway, as she preferred to stay at home and asso- 
ciate with disreputable characters. He also ordered her not 
to receive Viscount Cole, or Sir Frederick Johnstone, but, as 
in the other case, the husband was disobeyed, and his house 
was used by them against his will during his absence. On the 
27th of February, 1868, Lady Mordaunt was prematurely con- 
fined of a child which was afflicted in the eyes with a hideous 
disease. The first question asked by Lady Mordaunt immedi- 
ately after her confinement, was of the nurse. She asked, " Is 
the child diseased?" The nnrse answered, "My Lady, you 
mean deformed;" and Lady Mordaunt answered, "No, you 
know what I mean." This question was repeated five or six 
times, and, during the night, she said to her sister, Mrs. Forbes, 
"If yon do not let me talk I will go mad," meaning thereby 
that she desired to make a confession. The nurse asked if she 
should fetch Sir Charles to her, and she said "no," but added, 
"This child is not Sir Charles's at all— but Lord Cole's." She 
then stated that she had behaved improperly with Lord Cole 
in June, 1867, at her husband's house. This was testified to 
by the nurse, and the occurrence took place at Walton Hall. 
She was afraid that the baby would be blind — the disease being 
an incurable one. 

The suit for divorce was opened in the Westminster Divorce 
Court February 16th, 1869, and some of the most eminent and 
aristocratic personages in England attended. The Prince of 
Wales was ashamed to be present until sent for, but as he was 
very anxious about the result he sent his private Secretary, Sir 
W. KnoUys, to watch the case. That gentleman was present 
every day, and manifested great interest in the testimony, which 
was very filthy, but not so filthy but that the Pall Mall Gazette 
and London Times, with other leading journals, should print 
every line of it, day by day, as it transpired in the Court. The 
trial continued seven days, Lord Penzance presiding, and it 
created as great an interest in London as the McFarland and 



A TREACHEROUS WIFE. 249 

Richardson case did in New York. No ladies were admitted 
to the Court, but two thousand, the majority of whom were of 
the cultivated and respectable class, sought admission during 
the first three days of the trial. All the relatives, of both par- 
ties, who could attend were ])resent. The Dowager-Lady Mor- 
daunt, mother of Sir Charles, testified strongly against her 
daughter-in-law, whom she accused of shamming insanity to hide 
her crime and dishonor. The plea of insanity was the defence 
set up by Sir Tliomas ]\Ioncrieffe, father of Lady Mordaunt. 
The testimony was very contradictory. Some of the physicians 
swore that Lady Mordaunt was perfectly sane, but that she 
feigned insanity to screen herself, while others testified that 
she was not in a sound condition of mind. 

But the evidence was very clear against Lady Mordaunt de- 
spite of all endeavors to save her, or rather to save the Prince 
of Wales, through the unfortunate lady. Testimony was ad- 
duced, that, one evening in November, 1868, Lady Mordaunt 
absented herself from Waltoii Hall and went to London in 
company with Captain Farquhar, one of her "fast" young 
male friends, and that while there she stopped a whole night 
with him at the Palace Hotel. To blind her husband she wrote 
the following note to him : 

Palace Hotel, Buckingham Gate, Nov. 8. 
My Darling Charlie — One line to say I shall not be able to reach 
home by twelve o'clock train, but will come by the one which reaches at 
3.50. Send carriage to meet me. I felt liorribly dull by myself all yester- 
day evening. I have not had much time as yet to-day. I have seen Priestly 
and will tell you all about it when I come home. 
Your affectionate wife, 

HARRIET ]\IORDAUNT. 

Frederick Johnson, a footman of Lady Mordaunt, testified as 
follows : 

Frederick Johnson testified : — T was formerly footman to Sir C. ^lor- 
daunt. While Captain Farquhar was staying at Walton, in the autumn of 
1867, I took a note, I believe, from Mrs. Cadogan, into Lady Mordaunt's 
sitting-room. The captain was there. They had carving tools before them. 
The rest of the party were out shooting. I did not knock befinxi entering. 
Lady Mordaunt told me I ought not to come in without knocking. She had 



250 FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

not told me so before. I went with Lady Mordaunt, in the spring of 1868, 
to the Alhambra. Captain Farquhar was there. Lady Kinnoul (with 
whom Lady Mordaunt was staying) went, too, in her own carriage, and 
Lady !Mordaimt in a hired one. Lady Mordaunt left about twelve. The 
Captain rode part of the way home with her. I have posted three or four 
letters ft-om Lady Mordaunt to him, and have also delivered a letter to him. 
The Prince of Wales called once in 1867 ; I did not see him at the house 
a<Tain. He also called on Lady Mordaunt while she was staying with Lady 
Kinnoul. I have taken letters from her Ladyship addressed to the Prince; 
some I took to Marlborough House, and others I posted. 

Cross-examined. — Letters were given me by her Ladyship, her maid, and 
the butler. I posted a great many. The Prince called at Lady Kinnoul's 
to see Lady Mordaunt just after she had got better. She had been confined 
to her room. 

Ke-examined. — I took two or three letters to Marlborough House; two I 
am positive, and I think I posted three to the Prince of Wales within three 
days. 

The strongest testimony against Lady Mordaunt was given 
by Miss Jessie Clark, lady's maid to the wretched woman. It 
was full and comprehensive, and I give it here from the official 
report, cooked up by the Prince of Wales' friends, with exten- 
uating notes, which I omit. 

Jessie Clarke was then called, and deposed, — I was lady's-maid to Lady 
Mordaunt from her marriage till she left Walton. In the autumn of 1867 
Captain Fanjuhar came on a visit, and stayed about a week. He and Lady 
Mordaunt were very much together. 

In November, 1867, Lady Mordaunt went up to London, and I accom- 
panied her. We stayed at the Palace Hotel, Buckingham Gate, and re- 
mained two nights. We arrived at the hotel about 5 p. m., and about half- 
past ten I saw Captain Farquhar on the landing outside the sitting-room 
with Lady Mordaunt. Tlie bedroom was a short distance ofl". I did not 
see him come or leave. Iler ladyship went to bed about a quarter to eleven, 
and I called her the next morning at half-past eight. I had arranged the 
bedroom for her. In the morning I noticed that the books had been moved, 
though her ladyship never used to move anything that I arranged. The 
next day she was out the greater part of the day, and went out again about 
six. She had not returned about ten, when I went to bed, and she told me 
not to sit up, as she would not want me. 

After returning to Walton she was taken suddenly ill in the night, and 
was confined to her iX)om for a week. She then got into her sitting-room. 
In arranging her toilet-table I found a letter, not in an envelope, under a 
pincushion. I read it. [Notice to produce the letter was here i)roved, Dr. 



THE PRINCE OF WALES CALLS OFTEN. 251 

Deane stating that be knew nothing of it.] I replaced it, and a few days 
afterwards showed it to the butler, then putting it back again. I afterwards 
saw her hidyship take it and put it into the fire. It Avas dated from "Tlie 
Tower, Saturday," and said, '• Darling, I arrived here tliis morning about a 
quarter to nine, very tired and slee[)y, as you may suppose. It added that 
he had seen his name inserted in the Pusl as Farmer instead of Fanjuhar, 
and said, " So it's all right, darling, as I was afraid Charles would be sus- 
picious if he saw my name in the arrivals at the hotel with yours." The 
letter was signed " Yours, Arthur." I found it the day after she left the 
bedroom. She seemed surprised when she found it, and said she did not 
think there were any lettei's about, and then burnt it. 

In September, 1868, I had occasion one evening to go into her ladyship's 
bedroom, and Captain Farquhar came in. Her ladyship was not there, and 
the Captain did not know I Avas there. He walked to the table, took some 
flowers up, and left. During the season in 18G7 and 1808, Sir Charles and 
Lady Mordaunt were in town. Sir Charles usually went out in the after- 
noon to his Parliamentary duties. Tlie Prince of Wales called two or tliree 
times in 18G7 at that time of the day, and in 18G8 more frequently. In 
18G8 he usually came about four in the afternoon, and stayed from'one to 
one and a half or two hours. Her ladyship was always at home and saw 
him. No one was in the drawing-room at the time. The Prince did not 
come in his private carriage. I do not remember that Sir Charles was ever 
at home when the Prince called in 1SG8. 

Lord Penzance. — Sir Charles himself has told us that he was at home on 
one occasion, three weeks before he left for Norway. 

Examination continued. — The Prince came about once a week. In ]\Iarch, 
18G8, I attended Lady ]\Iordaunt Avhile on a visit to Lady Kinnoul, in Bel- 
grave-S(juare, Sir Charles being then at "^^'alton. The Prince came there one 
Sunday, for I met him leaving as I was coming in. Lady ]\Iordaunt showed 
me a letter from the Prince before she was married, and 1 have delivered 
letters to her in the same hand Avriting ; six or seven times, perhaps, in 1868. 
I also received two or three letters from her addressed to the Prince, which 
I gave the footman (Johnson) to post. During the summer of 18G8, Lord 
Cole used to call twice or thrice a week in the afternoon, more frocjuently 
when Sir Charles was out. Lady Mordaunt was then at home. She told 
me we were to go home in a week after Sir Charles went to Norway [15th 
of June], but we did not go till the 7th of July. During that interval Lord 
Cole used to call, and on the 27th of June he dined there with another gen- 
tleman and lady, whom I do not know. Tlicy had not left at half-past 
twelve, when I went to bed. Her ladyship invariably told me not to sit up 
for her after twelve. "We went to Paddington to take the train. Lord Cole 
met her there, and took the tickets, giving me mine, and handing Lady Mor- 
daunt into a first-clars empty compartment. He stood by the door till the 
train was starting, and then got in. He left at Reading, the first stopping 



252 FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

r 

station. Tlie other servants came down on the lOtli, and Lord Cole also ; 
he remained till the 14th, and the next day Sir Charles returned. 

In December, 18G8, I was staying with Lady Mordaunt at the Alexandra 
Hotel, Knightsbridge. The Duke and Duchess of Athole stayed there with 
her. Tlie day after they left Sir F. Johnstone came, and left her ladyship's 
sitting-room about midnight. I was at Walton during her confinement, and 
until she left. After the nurse left, on the 27th of March, I attended on her. 
The note produced I found soon after the 10th of April in one of her ladyship's 
pockets in a dress whicli she had recently worn. [This was the letter read 
yesterday addressed to the nurse, and bidding her say nothing more about 
the nonsense the writer had uttered.] About the 25th of April I noticed in 
the paper the death of the Countess of Bradford. I showed it to Lady Mor- 
daunt, who said, " Poor thing, I'm so sorry," and said she would have to go 
into mourning. I provided temporary mourning, and her ladyship directed 
me to get two mourning dresses, as she would not be going about much. 
She also selected mourning jewelry. On the 6th of May I saw her be- 
fore the physicians came. She was conversing with Mrs. Forbes, who asked 
for some brandy and soda water, and while she was drinking it Lady Mor- 
daunt laughed, and said, " Helen, if you drink all that I'm sure you'll be 
tipsy." llie same evening Mrs. Cadogan called, and I took a photograph 
in. They were talking very comfortably. On the 12th of May, while dress- 
ing her ladyship, she remarked on the dress Lady Kinnoul wore, and said, 
" What a larky old thing she is." I told her Mrs. Forbes admired a certain 
dress of hers, and she replied that she wore it a long time at Yowle [jSIrs. 
Forbes' residence]. Her ladyship looked at the newspapers until the time 
of her leaving, the 15th of May. Down to that day I constantly attended 
on her. I have never seen her since. I never saw anything indicative of 
unsound mind. She was perfectly rational and sensible, and appeared to 
understand everything. 

Henry Bird, an old servant of the family, and butler, testi- 
fied in a candid, frank way, to what he knew, ^s follows : 

Henry Bird. — I am butler to Sir C. ^lordaunt, and have been in the ser- 
vice of the flimily thirty ycai*s. Lord Cole, Captain Farquhar, and Sir F. 
Johnstone visited Walton Hall. In the autumn of 18G7 I accompanied Sir 
Charles and Lady Mordaunt to Scotland. Captain Farquhar was staying 
at the same place, and I noticed that he and her ladyship were often to- 
gether. Lady Mordaunt was more frequently with him than with other 
people. A few days after we returned to Walton he came to visit. He was 
often in her sitting room, generally alone with her. Sir Charles was fre- 
(juently out shooting at the time. Jessie Clarke made a conununication to 
nie, and showed me a letter. ITiat was about ten days after Lady Mor- 
daunt's return to London. It was in Captain Farquhar's writing. I read 
it and returned it to Clarke. It was dated at the Tower, and said, " Darling, 



FARQUHAR AND JOHNSTONE. 253 

I got home here, tired and weary, as you may suppose. I have read the 
Morning Post, and have seen that they have inserted my name as Farmer. 
If they had inserted it Farquhar, Sir Charles would have been suspicious." 
There was also an allusion to having attended a play, and the persons they 
had seen there. Clarke did not tell me where she had found it. I refeiTed 
to the Post of November 7 and 9, 1867 ; Sir Charles took it in. I refeiTed 
to it before I saw the letter, on account of what Clarke told me, and I put 
aside the two papers in my cupboard. On the 7th, among the arrivals at 
the Palace Hotel, Buckingham-gate, Lady Mordaunt's name is given, and 
on the 9th Captain Farmer's. In January, 1868, Captain Farquhar visited 
Walton, and staid about a week. There were other visitors, and there was 
not so much opportunity for him and Lady Mordaunt to be together. I 
once found them together in the billiard-room, standing close together near 
the billiard-table; they seemed startled, and I apologised and left. In 1867 
and 1868 the Prince of Wales called at Sir Charles's London house — in 
1868 about once a week; but one week twice. He came about four p. m., 
and stayed from one to two hours. I received him. Sir Charles Avas then 
at the House of Commons, or out pigeon-shooting. Lady JMordaunt gave 
me directions that when the Prince called no one else was to be admitted. 
After Sir Charles left for Norway the Prince took luncheon there once, with 
a sister of Lady Mordaunt and a gentleman. The last two went away to- 
gether, but the Prince remained about twenty minutes alone with Lady 
Mordaunt. Lord Cole visited the house two or three times a week — more 
frequently when Sir Charles was out and after he had left for Norway. Sir 
Charles was seldom at home in the afternoon. Lord Cole and two others 
dined with Lady Mordaunt after Sir Charles's departure. The two others 
left about eleven, but Lord Cole stayed in the drawing-room till about a 
quarter to one. I knew this by hearing the front door bang, and by observ- 
ing that his hat and coat were gone. I went down to AValton on the 10th 
of July ; Lord Cole arrived the same day, and left the day before Sir 
Charles's return. Sir F. Johnstone, when he stayed at Walton, was often 
in her ladyship's sitting-room while the rest of the party were shooting or 
hunting. I left Walton with Sir Charles on the 5th of April, 1869. After 
her confinement Lady Mordaunt used to take the papers from me, and once 
proposed to go fishing, as she had done before ; but I said it was too cold. 
She seemed quite rational. I went on the 20th of August to Worthington in 
order to accompany her to Bickley. She shook hands with me. I told her 
Sir Charles had gone to Scotland, and that Taylor, the gamekeeper, had 
gone with him. She laughed and said, " Only think of 'Taylor's going." 
She referred to the death of the Dowager — Lady Mordaunt's son, Mr. Arthur 
Smith, and said how sorry his father must be to lose his only son. I re- 
mained five or seven minutes. 



25 J: FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

A package of letters, a love valentine, and some flowers, 
wliich the Prince of Wales had sent Lady Mordaunt, were found 
by Miss Jessie Clarke, and were given to Sir Charles Mordaunt 
by her. It has been stated there were other letters from the 
Prince of Wales to Lady Mordaunt, which were destroyed in 
time to save tlie Prince from the reputation of a dastard. The 
letters which were found were produced in court, but were not 
read in the early stage of the proceedings, until the leading 
newspapers had by some stratagem succeeded in getting copies, 
which they published, to the great indignation of Lord Pen- 
zance and other toadies of the Prince. These letters I give 
as specimens of the style of writing, amusement, and compan- 
ions, which the dear Prince affects. They are ungrammatical, 
silly, and slangy, and show a vivid dearth of ideas in the heir 
to a great kingdom. 

I. — She Sends Him Muffetees. 

" Sandringham, King's Lynn, January 13, 1867. 
"]\Iy dear Lady Mordaunt, — I am quite shocked never to have 
answered your kind letter, written some time ago, and for the very pretty 
muffetees, which are very useful this cold weather. I had no idea where 
you had been staying sine J your marriage, but Francis Knollys told me that 
you are in Warwickshire. I suppose you will be up in London for the 
opening of Parliament, when I hope I may perhaps have the pleasure of 
seeing you and making the acquaintance of Sir Charles. I was in London 
for only two nights, and returned here Saturday. The rails were so slippery 
that we thought we should never arrive here. There has been a heavy fall 
of snow here, and we are able to use our sledges, which is capital fun. 
" Believe me, yours ever sincerely, 

"Albert Edward." 

n. — Would Like to See Her Again* 

" Monday. 
" My r>EAR Lady Mordaunt, — I am sure you will be glad to hear that 
the Princess was safely delivered of a little girl this morning and that both 
are doing very well. I hope you will come to the Oswald and St. James's 
Hall this week. There would, I am sure, be no harm your remaining till 
Saturday in town. I shall like to see you again. 

" Ever yours most sincerely, 

"Albert Edaa'ard." 



SAM BUCKLEY IN HIS KILT. 255 

m. — She Brings Him an Umbrella. 

"Marlborough House, May 7, 1867. 
" My dear Lady Mordaunt, — Many thanks for your letter, and I am 
very sorry that I should have given you so much trouble looking for the 
ladies' umbrella for me at Paris. I am very glad to hear that you enjoyed 
your stay there. I shall be going there on Friday next, and as the Princess 
is so much better, shall hope to remain a week there. If there is any com- 
mission I can do for you there it will give me the greatest pleasure to carry 
it out. I regret very much not to have been able to call upon you since 
your return, but hope to do so when I come back from Paris, and have an 
opportunity of making the acquaintance of your husband. 
" Believe me yours very sincerely, 

"Albert Edward." 

IV. — Hamilton's Wife is Good Looking. 

"Marlborough House, Oct. 13. 
"My dear Lady IMordaunt, — Many thanks for your kind letter, 
which I received just before we left Dunrobin, and I have been so busy 
here that I have been iniable to answer it before. I am glad to hear that 
you are flourishing at Walton, and hope your husband has had good sport 
with the partridges. We had a charming stay at Dunrobin — fi-om the 19th 
.of September to the 7th of this month. Our party consisted of the Sand- 
wiches, Grosvenors (only for a few days), Sumners, Bakers, F. Marshall, 
Albert, Ronald Gower, Sir II. Pelly, Oliver, who did not look so bad in a 
kilt as you heard ; Lacelles, Falkner, and Sam Buckley, who looked first- 
rate in his kilt. I was also three or four days in the Reay Forest with the 
Grosvenors. I shot four stags. ]My total was twenty-one. P. John thanks 
you very much for your photo ; and I received two very good ones, accom- 
panied by a charming epistle, from your sister. We are all delighted with 
Hamilton's marriage, and I think you are rather hard on the young lady, as, 
although not exactly pretty, she is very nice looking, has charming manners, 
and is very popular with every one. From his letter he seems to be very 
much in love — a rare occurrence now-a-days. I will see what I can do in 
getting a presentation for the son of Mrs. Bradshaw for the Royal Asylum 
of London, St. Ann's Society. Francis will tell you result. London is A'ery 
empty, but I have plenty to do, so time does not go slowly, and I go down 
shooting to Windsor and Richmond occasionally. On the 2Gth I .^hall shoot 
with General Hall at Newmarket, the following week at Kiiowlsley, and 
then at Windsor and Sandringham belbrc we go abroad. This will be prob- 
ably on the 18th or 19th of next month. You told me when I last saw you 
that you were probably going to Paris in November, but I suppose you have 
given it up. I saw in the papers that you were in London on Saturday. I 
wish you had let me know, as I would have made a point of calling. Tlierc 



256 FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

are some good plays going on, and we are going the rounds of them. My 
brother is here, but at the end of the month he starts for Plymouth on his 
long cruise of nearly two years. Now I shall say good-by, and hoi)ing that 
probably we may have a chance of seeing you belbre we leave, 

" I remain, yours most sincerely, " Albert Edwaud." 

y. — Don't Ivnow the Height of the Ponies. 

"White's, Nov, 1. 
My dear Lady Mordauxt, — Many thanks for your letter, which I 
received this morning. I cannot tell you at this moment the exact height 
of the ponies in question, but I think they are just under fourteen hands, 
but as soon as I know for certain I shall not fail to let you know. I would 
be only too hapjiy if they would suit you, and have the pleasure of seeing 
them in your hands. It is quite an age since I have seen or heard anything 
of you, but I trust you had a pleasant trip abroad, and I suppose you have 
been in Scotland since. Lord Dudley has kindly asked me to shoot with 
him at Buckenham on the 9th of next moiith, and I hojie I may, perhaps, 
have the pleasure of seeing you there. 

" Believe me, yours ever sincerely, 

" Albert Edward." 

VI. — The " Great " Oliver is Coming. 

" Sandringham, King's Lynn, Nov. 30. 
"My dear Lady' Mordaunt, — I was very glad to hear from Colonel 
Kingscote the other day that you had bought my two ponies. I also trust 
that they will suit you, and that you will drive them for many a year. I 
have never driven them myself, so I don't know whether they are easy to 
drive or not. I hope you have had some hunting, although the ground is 
so hard that in some parts of the country it is quite stopjjcd. We had our 
first shooting party this week, and got 809 head one day, and twenty-nine 
woodcocks. Next week the great Oliver is coming. He and Blandford 
had thought of going to Algiers; but they have now given it up, and I don't 
know to what foreign clime they are going to betake themselves. I saw 
Lady Dudley at Onwallis, and I thought her looking very well. I am sorry 
to hear that you won't be at Buckenham when I go there, as it is such an 
age since I have seen you. If there is anything else (besides horses) that 
I can do for you, ])lease let me know, and 

" I remain, yours ever sincerely, "Albert Edward." 

VII. — Sorry to Hear That She Has Been Seedy. 

" Sandringham, King's Lynn, Dec. 5. 
"My dear Lady !Mordaunt, — Many thanks for your letter, which I 
received this evening, and am very glad to hear that you like the ponies, 



THE PRINCE HAS THE MEASLES. 257 

but I hope they will be well driven before you attempt to drive them, as I 
know they are fresh. They belonged originally to the Princess ^lary, who 
drove them for some years, and when she married, not wanting them just 
then, I bought them from her. I am not surprised that you have had no 
hunting lately, as the frost has made the ground as hard as iron. AVe hope, 
however, to be able to hunt to-morrow, as a thaw has set in. We killed 
over a thousand head on Tuesday, and killed forty woodcocks to-day. Oliver 
has been in great force, and as bumjjtious as ever. Blandford is also here, 
so you can imagine what a row goes on. On Monday next I go to Bucken- 
ham, and I am indeed very sorry that we sliall not meet there. I am very 
sorry to hear that you have been seedy, but hope that you are now all rif'ht 
again. " Ever yours very sincerely, 

"Albert Edward " 

VIII. — He is Anxious. 

" Tliursday. 
" My dear Lady Mordauxt, — I am sorry to find by the letter that I 
received from you this morning that you are unwell, and that I shall not 
be able to i)ay you a visit to-day, to Avhiuh I had been looking forward with 
so much pleasure. To-morrow and Saturday I shall be hunting in Notting- 
hamshire, but if you are still in town, may I come to see you about five on 
Sunday afternoon? And hoping you will soon be yourself again, 

"Believe me, yours ever sincerely, "Albert Edward." 

IX. — He Had the INIeasles. 

" Sunday. 

" My dear Lady Mordauxt, — I cannot tell you how distressed I am 
to hear from your letter that you have got the measles, and that I shall in 
consequence not have the pleasin-e of seeing you. I have had the measles 
myself a long time ago, and I know what a tiresome complaint it is. I trust 
you will take great care of yourself, and have a good doctor with you. 
Above all, I should not read at all, as it is very bad for the eyes, and I 
suppose you will be forced to lay up for a time. The weather is very favor- 
able for your illness , and wishing you a very speedy recovery, 

"Believe me, yours most sincerely, "Albert Edward." 

X. — Anxious Agaix. 

" Sundny. 

"My dear Lady Mordauxt, — Many thanks for your kind Utter. I 
am so glad to hear that you have made so good a recovery, and to be able 
soon to go to Hastings, Avhich is sure to do you a great deal of good. I 
hope that perhaps on your return to London I may have the pleasure of 
seeing you. " Believe me, yours very sincerely, 

"Albert Edward." 



258 FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

XL — The "Great" Fraxcis is to Arrive. 

Sandringliam, King's Lynn, Nov. 16. 
"My dear Lady Mordaunt, — I must apologise for not having an- 
swered your last kind letter, but accept my best thanks for it now. Since 
the lOth I have been here at Sir William Knollys' house, as I am building 
a totally new one. I am here en garcon, and we have had very good shoot- 
ing. The Duke of Cambridge, Lord Sufiield, Lord Alfred Paget, Lord de 
Grey, Sir Frederick Johnstone, Chaplin, General Hall, Captain (Sam) 
Buckley, Major Grey, and myself, composed the party ; and the great Fran- 
cis arrived on Saturday, but he is by no means a distinguished shot. Sir 
Frederick Johnstone tells me he is going to stay with you to-morrow for the 
AVarwick races, so he can give you the best account of us. This afternoon, 
after shootin;;, I return to London, and to-morrow night the Princess, our 
three eldest children, and myself, start for Paris, where we shall remain a 
week, and then go straight to Copenhagen, where we spend Christmas, and 
the beginning of January we start on a longer trip. We shall go to Venice, 
and then by sea to Alexandria, and up the Nile as far as we can get ; and 
later to Constantinople, Athens, and home by Italy, and I don't expect we 
shall be back again before April. I fear, therefore, I shall not see you for 
a long time, but trust to find you, perhaps, in London on our return. If 
you should have time, it will be very kind to write me sometimes. Letters 
to ]\Iarlborough House, to be forwarded, will always reach me. I hope you 
will remain strong and well, and wishing you a very pleasant winter, 

"I remain, yours most sincerely, "Albert Edward." 

On the afternoon of the fifth day of tlie trial, the Prince of 
"Wales, wlio had been driven by his royal mother to take the 
step, much against his will, appeared in court to testify, nomi- 
nally at his own request, but really from a fear of public opin- 
ion. The presiding judge of the Divorce Court, Lord Penzance, 
when he heard that the Prince desired to testify in his own be- 
half, exerted himself in such an extreme fashion, as to call 
down the ridicule and scorn of the London press for his servile 
proceedings. Having been informed that the Prince was about 
to ap])ear in court, this flunkey judge, who had been created a 
peer for something that he had done as a lawyer, was most eager, 
painfully eager, in fact, to accommodate his Royal Highness. 
The latter was treated by the judge with a respect which was 
a combination of profundity, enthusiasm, and excitement. 
One journal suggested to the learned judge, that while the 



SIR FREDERICK JOHNSTONE TESTIFIES. 259 

Prince was in attendance on the trial, it was the duty of the 
magistrate to have a smoking room fitted up for the special use 
of the Prince, while another claimed that a billiard table should 
be provided for the amusement of the Prince between the in- 
tervals of the evidence, and asked Lord Penzance to be careful 
and open court daily at an hour to suit the convenience of the 
Heir Apparent, who is I believe, a late riser. It is a rule of 
British law, that the members of the Royal family cannot bo 
called upon to testify in any case, unless of their own free will, 
and then they are not asked to swear to the evidence which 
they may give, as their simple aflfirmation is deemed to be suf- 
ficient. The Prince of Wales on this occasion, however, thought 
it necessary to be sworn, and he testified that he knew Sir 
Charles and Lady Mordaunt, and that Lady Mordaunt had been 
an acquaintance of his before his marriage to the Princess of 
Wales. He also testified that he was fond of riding in han- 
som cabs, and lastly, he swore that there never had been any 
improper familiarity or criminal act between himself and Lady 
Mordaunt. This statement, in open court, was a great relief 
to the Queen, who it is said, at once upon hearing of it sent 
for the Prince to come to Buckingham Palace, and on his arri- 
val he was welcomed warmly by his mother. 

The next witness examined was Sir Frederick Johnstone, 
who testified that he had gone to dine with Lady Mordaunt at 
the Alexandra Hotel, in obedience to a request which she made 
by letter, to that effect. The dinner was a tete-atete one, (no 
one. being present but Sir Frederick and Lady jMordaunt) in a 
private room, and it lasted from four o'clock in tlic afternoon 
until twelve o'clock at night. Sir Frederick acknowledged 
that the dinner took place without the knowledge of Sir Cliarles 
Mordaunt, and that he never told the latter of the circumstance 
afterward, although a visitor at Walton Hall. This closed the 
case on evidence. A paper had been found in Lady Mordaunt's 
handwriting, with the memoranda " 280 days from June 29 — 
April 3d," referring, as it was supposed, to her first meeting 
with Viscount Cole. Sir Charles Mordaunt^ in his afiidavit, 
alleged the marriage on the Gth of December, 1866, at St. 



2G0 FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

John's Episcopal Church, Perth ; cohabitation at Walton Hall, 
and at 6 Bclgrave-square ; and adultery with Viscount Cole in 
May, June, and July, 18G8, at Chesham-place, and in July, 1868, 
and January, 1869, at Walton Hall ; and adultery with Sir 
Frederick Johnstone, in November and December, 1868, at 
Walton Hall, and in December, 1868, at the Alexandra Hotel, 
Knightsbridge ; and adultery also with some person between 
the loth of June, 1868, and the 28th of February, 1869. 

The English aristocracy never have liad such a blow dealt 
at their corrupt social system, as the developments of this suit 
impelled against them. "Reynolds' Newspaper," a London 
journal with a circulation of 280,000 copieS-Hveekly, spoke in 
thunder tones as follows, to its readers,*fte workingmen of 
London : . 

"the prince of wales ix the divorce court. 

The great social scandal to which we have frequently alluded, has now 
become blazoned to the world through the instrumentality of the Divorce 
Court. Nothing was left imdone that might hush it up, so that the Prince 
of AV ales' name should not figure in so discreditable a business. Every ef- 
fort was made to silence Sir Charles Mordaunt. A peerage was, we believe, 
offered him. Any place of emolument he asked for would willingly have 
been f^iven him. All the honors and dignities the crown and government 
have it in their power to bestow would readily have been prostituted to in- 
sure his silence. Lord Penzance, at the last moment, earnestly strove to keep 
the name of the Prince from coming before the public. Sir Charles ]\Ior- 
daunt, however, was deaf to every persuasion, and, like a noble minded man 
and high spirited gentleman, scouted all attempts to shut his mouth ; and, 
with contemptuous indifference to the entreaties of the judge, and disre- 
garding the course adopted by his own counsel, at once told the whole story 
of his supposed dishonor, without blinking facts of concealing names. He 
told the court that he forbade his wife continuing her acquaintance with the 
Prince of Wales on account of his character. He intimated to the Prince 
that his visits should cease. lie, however, alleges that, despite this intima- 
tion, they were surreptitiously continued ; that letters of a compromising 
character were found ; and that other circumstances occurred leading him to 
sup[)Ose that an improper intimacy existed between the Prince and his wife. 
It should be borne in mind that when all this is said to have occurred the 
Prince of Wales was a married man himself, and the fiither of a family. 
Tlie question, therefore, remains to be solved, is he an adulterer or not ? Can 
he disprove the apparently damnatory allegations of Sir C. Mordaunt ? Of 
course we do not wish to prejudge the case. We hope, for his own and for his 



THE FASTEST MAN IN ENGLAND. 261 

wife's sake, that he can completely refute the heavy accusation laid to his 
charge, and that he will do so at the earliest opportunity. But we have no 
hesitation in declaring that if the Prince of Wales is an accomplice in bring- 
ing dishonor to the homestead of an English gentleman ; if he has deliber- 
ately debauched the wife of an Englishman ; if he has assisted in renderin"' 
an honorable man miserable for life; if unbridled sensuality and lust have 
led him to violate the laws of honor and of hospitality — then such a man, 
placed in the position he is, should not only be expelled from decent society, 
but is utterly unfit and unworthy to rule over this country or even sit in its 
legislature." 

I don't sec how any writer could make a stronger case against 
Royalty, (however hostile his spirit,) tlian this fearless expo- 
sition hy the English journal of wide circulation, to which I have 
referred. The evidence of Sir Frederick Jolmstone, wliich I 
have omitted, was too disgraceful to appear in this work, al- 
though the English papers printed every line of it. "Well, the 
case went to the jury at last, after Lord Penzance had properly and 
carefully manipulated them, and a verdict was brought by them 
"that Lady Mordaunt being of unsound mind, was totally un- 
fit to instruct her attorneys," and thus Sir Cliarles Mordaunt, 
having been dishonored and his domestic happiness destroyed 
by a conspiracy of titled persons, had to be satisfied witli the 
verdict. In these days the plea of insanity is always a con- 
venient one, and is very useful in a desperate case. Sir Charles 
was not daunted, however, and appealed his case, but met with 
defeat again, and thus the matter rests, and Avill rest. It is 
the intention of the injured husband to visit America, as he is 
an admirer of our institutions. I do not wish to offer any com- 
ment whatever on the state of society in which such corruption 
exists. The facts must speak for themselves. 

The " fastest" young man in England is undoubtedly, William 
Alexander, Louis, Stephen, Douglas-Hamilton, Duke of Hamil- 
ton, ^larquis of Hamilton, Marquis of Douglas, Earl of Angus, 
Earl of Arran, Earl of Lanark, Baron Hamilton, Avcn, Pol- 
mont, Macansliire, Inncrdale, Abernethey and Jcdltui-gli For- 
est, and premier Duke and Peer in the Peerage of Scotland, 
Duke of Brandon (Suffolk), and Baron Dutton in tlie Peerage 
of Great Britain, Duke of Chatherault in France, Hereditary, 



262 



FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 



Keeper of the Ilolyrood House, and Deputy Lieutenant of some 
county with an unpronounceable name in Scotland. 

Possibly some of my readers, in going over this long line of 
titles, will recall the days of Bruce and Douglas, of " proud 
Angus," whom Marmion bearded in his hall, and of that Doug- 
las who carried the heart of Bruce, like a Paladin, amid the 
lances of Spain ; or perhaps the picture of Chevy Chase, and 
Douglas, and Percy, in armed fight, will be evoked with 
thoughts of the greatest historical House in Europe. Nobler 
descent, or more genuine historical honor, cannot be claimed 
by the holder of any lordly or royal title, than that which be- 
longs to the present Duke of Hamilton, who is as yet only 
twenty-seven years of age. He i.s a first cousin of the Emperor 

of France by his mother, 
Stephanie, Duchess of Ba- 
den, a noble, beautiful, 
and good woman, — who 
married the old Duke of 
Hamilton; and one of his 
sisters is married to the 
Prince of Monaco, a sov- 
ereign in his own right. 
Two other sisters of the 
present Duke are nuns, 
having been educated in 
the Roman Catholic faith 
by their mother. The 
fourth sister is married 
to a private gentleman of 
large fortune. 

The old Duke was in 
every sense a gentleman and a man of honor, but his two male 
descendants, the present Duke of Hamilton, and his brother, 
Lord Churchill Hamilton, are sad scapegraces — indeed I doubt 
if a rougher name would not be more appropriate. The young 
Duke, as soon as he came of age, fell heir to an income of 
£300,000 a year, and eight or nine country scats and residen- 




THE DUKE OF HAMILTON. 



INSULTS THE EMPEROR. 263 

ces. He had no sooner entered into possession of his estate, 
than he was surrounded by betting men, turf blackguards, 
spendthrifts, abandoned women, and dissolute noblemen of his 
own age. Every shilling of his gigantic fortune was squan- 
dered in three or four years, and his proud old name became a 
by-word of scorn and reproach when it was found that his 
debts amounted to £130,000. He had for his associates the 
Earl of Jersey, the Marquis of Waterford, the Prince of Wales, 
Lord Carington, the Duke of Newcastle, the Earl of "Winchel- 
sea, the Earl of Westmoreland, and other bankrupt and disso- 
lute nobles. For a long time polite society tolerated the Duke 
of Hamilton, because of his family, birth, and fortune, but when 
he lost the latter, those who formerly laughed at his wild actions 
and peccadilloes, now began to frown upon him as an enfant 
perdu. He was sowing too much wild oats, and his friends be- 
gan to desert him in disgust. A bad set of men who had control 
of the Duke, did not hesitate to drag his proud name and title 
through the gutters. At last his fellow noblemen, thoroughly 
ashamed of him, determined to give him a lesson. His name 
was put up for membership in the Jockey Club, and he was 
black-balled with great unanimity. The Duke of an almost 
royal famil}^ was treated in this ignominious way by the fathers 
of families, and brothers of girls of stainless birth, as a caution 
to him. The Duke being both bankrupt and disgraced, left 
England for the Continent, to avoid his thousand and one credit- 
ors, who cursed him bitterly when he departed. Passing through 
Paris, his cousin, the Emperor, invited him to dine at the 
Tuilleries. The Duke returned a curt verbal answer to his 
imperial relative, that he could not accept the invitation, " for 
he had neither clothes nor manners in which to appear at the 
Emperor's table." That same evening he appeared in a pri- 
vate box at the opera, dressed in a short double-breasted slioot- 
ing jacket, in company with two or three of the turfites (broken 
down betting men, who hung on to him for what they could 
get), and afterwards presided at a supper of which the less 
that is said the better, concerning the " ladies," who composed 
one-half of the twenty-four persons who sat down to table. 
17 



264 FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

After the Duke left England for the Continent, a sale of his 
effects was had. Hundreds of purchasers attended the sale 
out of curiosity, as they had attended the sale of " Skittle's" 
furniture, or as the Parisian dandies and lorettes attended the 
sale of the household gods of Marguerite Gautier, afterwards 
known as the " Dame aux Camelias." Every article belonging 
to the Duke realized a value of more than two or three hundred 
per cent, over its original value. Crowds of " snobs " and " cads " 
bought whips and pipes, riding jackets, cigar cases, canes, 
gloves, and boots, pictures of French dancers and German sou- 
brettes, as well as articles of crockery, at the most extravagant 
prices, simply because they had once been in the possession of 
a real live Duke, although he was a scamp. One miserable 
little tea-broker gave twenty-five pounds for a worn, poorly 
bound copy of the " Kisses of Johannes Secundus," with the 
idea that he was getting something very immoral — but he was 
disappointed of course. 

I saw him twice, this Duke of Hamilton, once in a low 
cabaret in Paris, which had for a name the strange and I thought 
very inappropriate title of the " Groves of the Evangelists." 

It was in a little street, or rather lane, called tlie Rue Belle- 
Cuisse, which is in the Quartier Breda. 

It was a low dingy little hole, this " Groves of the Evangel- 
ist," and the people present were chiefly infantry privates of 
some of the line regiments, who serve as a part of the garrison 
of Paris. They were a hard-drinking, ruffianly lot, and the 
women who sat on their laps were of all the obscene birds of 
night that I encountered in Paris, the very worst and most 
abandoned. 

A little girl, with a bold face and wearing a slatternly, torn 
dress, with a brazen pair of steely blue eyes, acted as bar-girl 
in this place, and measured out to the customers, petit verres 
of fiery Nantes brandy. 

Two men, young, and fashionably dressed, sat at a table, who 
appeared to be strangers in Paris, although they conversed 
fluently enough, in French, with each other. 

One of these was a fair, girlish-faced, young gentleman, with 



VILLAINY OF THE MARQUIS OP WATERFORD. 



265 



liair which is always termed auburn by the poets, while, as a 
contradiction it is generally denominated, in police returns — 
"red hair." This was the Duke of Hamilton. 

The second person at the table was a tall, athletic, and hand- 
some-looking fellow, of twenty-four or five years of age, with a 
smooth face, daring, black eyes, and a massive head well set 
upon a pair of broad shoulders. 

This individual was John De La Poer Beresford, Marquis of 
Waterford, Earl of Tyrone, Viscount Tyrone, and a Baron five 
times over in England and Ireland, a relation of the Archbishop 
of Armagh, Protestant Primate of Ireland, and having an in- 
come of about half a million dollars, annually, in his own right. 

This young Marquis of Waterford, did a most dastardly 
thing when he seduc- 
ed the wife of his 
bosom friend, the 
Hon.J.C. P. Vivian, 
M. P., a Junior Lord 
of the Treasury, who 
had placed the ut- 
most confidence in 
the Marquis. He took 
Mrs. Vivian with him 
to Paris, and there 
lived with her in 
open adultery for 
some time until he 
became tired of liis 
victim and then he 
ordered her with 
great coolness to re- 
turn to her dishon- 
ored husband. To 
make the matter worse she was the mother of two lovely chil- 
dren. Her married sister, the Honorable Mrs. Somebody, went 
to Paris to attempt to reclaim her, held an interview with her, 
and begged of her to return to her husband. She blankly re- 




MARQDI8 OF WATERFORD. 



266 FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

fused to do SO, giving as her reason that she loved "John" 
too much, — " John," I need not saj, being the Marquis of Wa- 
terford. 

Mr. Vivian having commenced a suit for divorce, tlic utter' 
villainy of the Marquis appeared when the letters of that no- 
bleman to his quondam friend Vivian were read, in which the 
great trust reposed by Mr. Vivian in Waterford was most pub- 
licly made manifest. 

This young nobleman is a grandson of the second ]\Iarquis 
of Waterford, who was distinguished as a companion to the 
Prince Regent, and as well for breaking olf door-knockers and 
bell-handles — a complaint that was chronic with him, and 
that seems to run in the family. 

The Marquis of Waterford is not quite so impoverished 
through his excesses as some of his friends, but 1 understand 
that his debts at one time amounted to X 60,000. 

My readers may recollect that, during the visit of the Prince 
of Wales to America, he had in the suite which accompanied 
him, a certain Duke of Newcastle, a young nobleman, who mar- 
ried, some years ago, a daughter of the great banker, Hoi)e. who 
brought licr husband an immense fortune. Beside these advan- 
tages there were few noblemen in England as highly connected, 
or as wealthy, as the Duke of Newcastle. Well, Miss Hope only 
served to stay tlie waning fortunes of this spendtln-ift for a short 
time, as he is now a bankrupt, and has to reside out of Eng- 
land to avoid tlie Sheriff's officers. While the execution was 
being levied in the magnificent mansion of tlie Duke, and be- 
fore his wife could leave the premises, the Duke liad gambled 
away thirteen thousand pounds, tlie last remnant of liis once 
princely fortune. This liopeful Duke has always been very 
intimate with the Prince of Wales. 

Another of the same reckless unprincipled set is the young 
Earl of Jersey, who was left an income of <£ 50,000 a year, 
every shilling of wliich is gone. Tliis young fool, who is en- 
dowed with the manners of a cabman, and who has a pot-house 
air in everything that he says or does, was deeply in debt at 
sixteen years of age, and before he left school he had borrowed 



THE MARQUIS OF HASTINGS. 



267 



^25,000 from the Jews, who now own him body and soul. His 
grand-motlicr, the Countess of Jersey, was, I believe, a mistress 
of George IV. 

The Marquis of Hastings, who died about two years ago, was 
also one of this same set 
of spendthrift, young 
harum-scarum, unprinci- 
pled scions of the Bluest 
Blood of which England 
can boast. All his mag- 
nificent fortune went in 
horses, and women, and 
yachts, and at last, wlien 
he died, at the age of 26, 
he had squandered some 
three or four millions of 
dollars, and, I lx4icvc,the 
title created as far back 
as 1389, became in the 
direct line, extinct. The 
Marquis lost one day at 
the Derl)y race on Lady ™= marquis of Hastings. 

Elizabeth, a favorite horse of his, the enormous sum of $150,- 
000 in gold. He married a beautiful and wealthy girl, and 
her fortune went in the general crash after liis death. He 
owned a magnificent yacht, and was in the habit of cruising in 
the Mediterranean with a coterie of dissolute young aristocrats 
like himself, and on board of this yacht scenes took place that 
might have made the cheek of Sardanapalus to blush — that is, 
provided that that bloated Assyrian ever blushed. 

Prince Christian of Schleswig, a beggarly little German 
kinglet, who was allowed to marry the Princess Helena, a 
daughter of Queen Victoria, and a very good girl, is said to be 
rather wild in his ways, but his allowance, X 10,000 a year 
from Parliament, lias to satisfy him whether he likes it or not. 
But in 1869 Prince Christian and the Duchess of Mccklcnburg- 
Strclitz had occasion to journey from Dover to Calais, and the 




268 FAST YOUNG ENGLAND. 

little German liad the impudence to send a bill of sixty eight 
pounds expenses to Parliament, despite tlie fact that lie received 
his allowance regularly. Professor Fawcett, a liberal member of 
Parliament, who brought in bills to abolish religious distinctions 
in Dublin University, and in favor of woman suffrage, de- 
manded the items of the bill, and failing to get them, moved 
that the Prince Christian's bill be struck out of the estimates. 
To show what is thought of such unbridled extravagance — the 
fare being only about two pounds from Dover to Calais — ^I give 
the satire and comments of the Queeii's 3Iessenger of August 
5, 1869, upon the matter. This paper is a weekly organ, pub- 
lished in London. 

" Happily there are always two ways of looking at a question, else the 
following bill, which was presented last week to Parliament, might have sug- 
gested puzzling reflections : 

DUE FROM BRITISH TAXPAYER TO BRITISH GOVKUXMEXT : 

For cost of presents made by Duke of Edinburgh during voy- 
age to Cape and Australia, £3,374 14 

For conveyance of Prince Christian and Duchess of Mecklen- 

burg-Strelitz from Dover to Calais, _ _ . 68 

For royal present to Peter, king of Congo, as reward for act 

of Christian charity, - - - - - - - 0126 

For luncheon to Prince AVilliam of Ilosse, - - - 13 

For providing food for inhabitants of Cephalonia after the 

island had been injured by earthcpiake, - - - - 10 9 6 

For rigging-out a pier at Ant werp for reception of Prince of 

Wales, 2 10 

For robes, collars, and badges for certain persons who had re- 
ceived honor of knighthood, ------ 1,000 

For maintenance of Congo, pirate chief, at Ascension, - 38 3 

Cost of presents to King of Masaba, by Captain of H. M. ship 

Investigator, -------., 204 

£4,509 4 
Tlius it costs 13/. to give a luncheon to Prince Wilham of Hesse, and only 
10/. to relieve an island full of people who are dying of famine. It requires 
2/. to lay down red cloth for the Prince of Wales to walk on, and only 12s. 
Q(L to reward King Peter for an act of Christian charity. These are facts 
•worth knowing. The only thing we regret is that Government should have 
•withheld information as to the precise nature of the gift with which King 
Peter was gratified. Did this mighty Empire present him with six pairs oi 



LORD ARTHUR CLINTON. 269 

cotton socks, or request him to accept a gingham umbrella secondhand ? 
And the King of Masaba, who figures anonymously, what did he get for 
21. Os. 4.d. ? Was it a pair of boots and some pocket-handkerchiefs, or a few 
pots of Scotch marmalade and a dozen pints of Bass? As to the other 
items of the bill, it is so obviously right that the country should be made to 
pay GSl. eveiy time Prince Christian crosses the Channel, that we can only 
wonder anybody should ever have thought otherAvise, and moved, as Mr. 
Fawcett did, that the sum be struck out of the estimates. We live in strange 
times, forsooth, when a prince cannot charge the cost of his railway-tickets 
on to the national purse without being made the subject of unmannered 
comments I " 

And now having given as brief a resume as I possiblj^ could 
of the salient characteristics of the "fast" young English aris- 
tocracy — having shown how extravagant, useless, dishonorable 
and unprincipled many of them arc, I will close by mentioning 
that it is not long since the English journals were filled with the 
e\idence on the trial of two young men who were arrested in 
London for dressing and appearing in public as females. They 
were frequently seen at the Opera, the race course, and in other 
public places, in company with Lord Arthur Clinton, a well- 
known young nobleman. Their apartments were searched, and 
waterfalls, chignons, puffs, and all the articles of the female 
toilet and female wearing apparel, were found in tlieir posses- 
sion. Brought before a magistrate, they manifested a strange 
and unmanly behavior, and bore without shame the details of 
the medical examination. Lord Clinton, in company with 
some otber friends, had been paying their addresses to these 
hybrid creatures, and following in the footsteps of some of the 
disgusting court favorites, of Avhich Juvenal and the Satirists of 
the Lower Empire speak, he was jealous of another young 
Lord, the cause being a rivalry for the affections of one of these 
hybrid things iu a woman's clothes ! 




CHAPTER XYIIL 

LORDS AND COjMMONS. 

HY, Sir, I do tliink the times 'ave changed 
a great deal, but I am afeered they will 
change wiiss nor ever agin. They do say 
as how Gladstone has, wen he likes, a will 
of his own to overturn the Crown itself. 
And I know 'is son — 'a past eight-and- 
twenty years the young one is. He is just a hit of a curate iu 
yon church of St. Mary's, Lamhith ; and I can say for 'im as* 
he is a hard-working man — it's no bed of ease, the parish — and 
'is father, who is now more than the Queen herself, might haA'e 
given young Gladstone the richest living in Ingland, and no- 
body to say boo to him for the favor. Yisar, I'm sixty past, 
last Miklemas, and man and boy I've lived in Lambeth ; and 
now I'm broke down with the parlyatics — but I once was a 
good man on the river, and could pull a wherry or waterman's 
tub with the best on 'em." 

The murky beams of an August sun were falling slantingly 
on the muddy waters beneath my feet as I leaned over the stone 
balustrades of Westminster Bridge, which connects the ancient 
borough of Westminster with the Surrey side of the River 
Thames. Far down the river, I could see craft of every de- 
scription lying in the stone docks, the pride and boast of all 
Englishmen. Bridge after bridge loomed up in the sun's hazy 
beams. Waterloo, Charing Cross, Blackfriars, Yauxhall, and 
Lambeth Bridges, crowded with traffic and swarming with the 
wild, heedless, ever-bustling life of the greatest city of the 



I 



c^ 



k^. ^^ 4 



w4 'w 








VIEW FROM WESTMINSTER BRIDGE. 273 

modern world. Under the piers of this grand bridge, nearly 
a thousand feet long, swept coal barges, wherries bearing noisy 
cockney watermen, who halloed to each other from roast-beef 
stomachs and brown-stout lungs, and every minute the paddling, 
roaring steamboats, peculiar to the Thames, — each boat about 
sixty feet long, their clean black hulls set off to advantage by 
the narrow streaks of red paint that served as an ornament to 
their keels, dashed to and fro, in and out of the bridge, con- 
veying homeward clerks, shop boys, barristers, solicitors, M. 
P.'s, business men from the city, physicians, and here and 
there a stray white neck-clothed curate of the Established 
Church, disgusted with the latest work of Parliament, while, 
within a few feet of him, scarcely conscious of the visible tri- 
umph that shone over his face, sat a Dissenting preacher read- 
ing Bright's last effoi-t in the Commons on behalf of Disestab- 
lishment. 

On either side of the Thames, beginning at one end and 
ceasing at the other end of the Houses of Parliament, the mag- 
nificent embankment of hewn granite stone stretches, thirty or 
forty feet in width, for a mile each way, thousands of foot pas- 
sengers traversing its massive blocks, each man and woman 
busy with his or her thoughts, or preoccupied with the passing 
vagaries of the hour. 

On my right is Westminster Palace and the Houses of Par- 
liament, the finest modern gothic buildings in the world. The 
dozen towers and belfries of this truly glorious edifice, gilded 
over with brass, glisten with the refulgent hues of the dying 
sunset, — for nine hundred and forty feet on the river, these mass- 
ive, brown buildings, (that, on the first view, bring up memories 
of some grand, old Gothic Cathedral,) stretch away with tower, 
buttress, and pinnacle, presenting a river facade which cannot 
be equaled by any other edifice for legislative purposes in tlic 
world. 

Beyond, to the left, on the Surrey side, I can see Lambeth 
Palace, with its faded reddish-brown brick piled up to the 
clouds, where resides his Grace, the high and puissant spiritual 
prince, tlie Archbishop of Canterbury and Primate of England. 
The feverish broil and confusion of the great city are all round 



274 



LORDS AND COMMONS. 



me, and arc present in, and to an extent pervade, the air above 
me. The whistling and puffing of the locomotives may be 
heard night and day as they sweep to and fro, conveying pas- 
sengers and freight to and 
from all parts of England 
and the Continent, over 
Charing Cross Bridge. 
The old man by my side 
on the bridge, with whom 
I have been conversing 
for half an hour, is an 
intelligent artisan of 
the conservative class, 
benumbed and enfeebled 
by illness, and his poor 
old watery, dazed utteran- 
ces confess to his aston- 
ishment at. the marvelous 
rapidity with which one 
of the great strongholds 
of every Englishman's 
belief, — the Established 
Church, has been over- 
turned by the now forem^>st man in Britain — William Ewart 
Gladstone. The old man has relations in America, somewhere, 
— he thinks, near Cincinnati, and he asks after their health and 
well-being with the most implicit trust that I should know all 
about them, believing that the Queen City is only a few miles 
distant l)y rail from New York. Yet the relatives of his youth 
and manliood have been absent over twenty years, and are pos- 
sibly all dead and dust by this time. 

As I have a desire to pay a visit to the House of Commons, 
and be a witness of the ])roceedings of that dignified body of 
legislators, I bid the Old Man of Lambeth a very good day, 
which he acknowledges in his own fashion, and I stroll across 
the Bridge and down Bridges street toward the Commons. As 
I pass the huge and massive Clock Tower, said to be four hund- 




WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 



''bobbies" and "cabbies." 275 

red feet in height, and of most beautiful design, I am warned 
by what I see all around me, that I am in the close vicinity of 
that edifice which contains within its walls annually the chosen 
wisdom and supposed best talent of England. Directly before 
me is the magnificent fane of Westminster Abbey, holding 
within its thousand storied urns, the ashes of the bravest, most 
intellectual, and most renowned, as well as the most wretched 
and unfortunate of Britain's dead. I can see, as I cross the 
bridge, the back portion of the Chapel of Henry the Seventh, 
with its superb and intricate net-work of tower, cornice, but- 
tress, groined and fillagree stone-work. Cabs, four-wheelers, 
and open carriages, with coachmen and footmen attired in 
gorgeous liveries, their wigs powdered and frizzed, are driving 
hither and thither, the occupants of some in full dress going 
to dinner, or to listen to the debates which are to take place 
to-night in the Lords or Commons. 

These magnificent flunkies wear a contemptuous look of 
ennui on their faces, and they survey all foot-passengers with 
blase glances of indifferent serenity, which I find almost im- 
possible to describe justly. The court-yard directly opposite 
St. Margaret's, of Westminster, is in a hollow below the grad- 
ing of the approach to the bridge, and is surrounded by a very 
handsome gilded iron railing, which is in turn surmounted by 
a row of lamps which encircle the House of Commons at night 
like a belt of fire. Within this enclosure are continually station- 
ed fifty or sixty hansom cabs for the convenience of the mem- 
bers who may need them in the intervals of debate, and on top 
of these cabs are to be found the cabbies who delight to bark 
and bite at the unsophisticated and verdant stranger. 

There are half a dozen of policemen, or "bobbies," as the 
cockney, in his refined slang, chooses to term tliem, wearing 
dark blue uniforms with silver gilt buttons, and the letter and 
number of their division on their close coat collars. The thick 
cloth-board hats, of a helmeted shajjc, that these poor fellows 
are compelled to wear, even in hot weather, are heavy enough 
to excite the compassion of the most hard-hearted person, ^n 
inspector of hacks, always on duty in the Palace Yard, may be 



276 LORDS AND COMMONS. 

seen moving to and fro, giving instructions to tlie malicious 
cabbies, who are listening to his scoldings with the most pro- 
voking indifference, real or assumed, as the case may be. 

Not being aware of the regulations, which do not permit a 
stranger or visitor to enter the House of Commons without 
being possessed of the written order of a member, I find myself 
notified at the splendidly arched gothic doorway that I cannot 
pass. Here is a difficulty I had not counted on. A friend 
from America, however, shows an order, which I afterwards 
discover only admitted one person. We pass in under the 
groined roof of one of the finest halls, architecturally consid- 
ered, in Europe. In this hall, over six hundred years ago on a 
New Year's day, a monarch of tlie Plantagcnet line fed six 
thousand poor people, and one may well believe the legend of 
old prosy Abbot Ingulph, of Croyland, as he looks around and 
above him at the grand dimensions of the stately hall. On 
either side as one enters are marble statues, life-size, of Hamp- 
den, Falkland, Walpole, Fox, Pitt, Burke, Grattan, and others, 
— the work of England's greatest sculptors, placed on pedestals 
of stone. 

"We are told by the policeman who attends at one of the in- 
ner doorways to seat ourselves on a stone bench in an alcove, 
and wait our turn as is the custom here. The Stranger's Gal- 
lery will not hold more than a hundred persons when crowded ; 
and when a heavy debate is in progress, on a great public 
measure, the gallery is sure to be full. Five persons are ad- 
mitted to the gallery at a time as soon as a gap is made in the 
benches by the departure of an equal number of spectators. 
Should a man leave his seat in the alcove for an instant he is 
certain to lose his turn, and he will be compelled to go to the 
bottom place and begin over again. As soon as there is room, 
the policeman makes a sign to those in waiting, and he mar- 
shals the five persons who have tickets, and they follow him 
through several passages and halls to the Lobby of the Com- 
mons — a large, square hall, beautifully decorated, and, turning 
to the left, they all ascend a winding stair to the ante-room, 
where the tickets are examined by an old, white-haired gentle- 



BILL OF FARE. 277 

man -^ho sits in a chair in evening dress, and, if correct, the 
batch are admitted to the Stranger's Galler}'', which is on the 
same floor, at the end of another dark passage. 

Before I leave the Lobby of the Commons, let me describe it 
briefly together with the Luncli Counter of the house,*'which 
even the greatest public men find it necessary to visit occa- 
sionally. It is a large square hall of lofty proportions, almost 
every inch of the walls and ceiling being ornamented in relief 
with the insignia of the Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. 

A score of the members are in the Lobby talking with one 
another, in an animated but not loud tone, or mayhap to some 
of their favored constituents who have admission. To the 
right is a counter running across an angle of the Lobby, at 
which ices, sandwiches, a glass of sherry, a glass of port, or a 
glass of brandy — all of a good quality, can be obtained by those 
of the members who do not wish to spoil a dinner by a hearty 
luncheon," or who do not wish to spend the time in going down 
stairs into a cosy suite of rooms, which I almost fancied were 
carved out of the beautiful oak paneling, and where a dinner nearly 
as good as may be found in England can be obtained at the prices 
and at the hours which I give in the Bill of Fare : One o'clock 
— Soups: Jardiniere, Is.; Calf 's Tail, Is. Joints: Shoulder 
of Mutton, 2s. ; Steak, stewed, 25. Entrees : Hashed Venison, 
3s. ; Filet Bceuf au Vin, 2s. ; Mutton Cutlets piquante, 2s. ; 
Lamb Chop, Is. Sd. Five o'clock to 6.30 — Salmon, Is. 6d. ; 
Sole, Is. ; White Bait, Is. ; Saddle of Mutton, 2s. ; Cold Roast 
Beef, Is. M. ; Cold Boiled Beef, Is. M. ; Cold Lamb, 2s. ; Cold 
Ham, Is. M. ; Lobster, Is. 3(Z. ; Ribs of Beef, 2s. At 7 o'clock, 
same prices. Puddings, 6d. ; Tarts, 6d. ; "Wine Jelly, 6d. ; 
French Beans, Qd. ; Green Peas, 6d. ; Salad, 6d. ; Cheese, Ad. 
This is the bill of fare, for one day only, of the steward, Mr. 
Nicoll, who purveys for the Lords and Commons of England 
in both Houses. 

I give the prices as a curiosity, showing on what nutriment 
heroes, statesmen, and orators are fed while attending St. 
Stephens, and how much they are taxed for their food. This 
may be trivial to some persons, but I contend the sum of hu- 



278 LORDS AND COMMONS. 

man existence is made up of trifles, and in England, particu- 
larly, of such substantial trifles as I have given above. Wel- 
lington gained the battle of Waterloo because his troops were 
well fed, while the raw levies, and even the Old Guard of Na- 
poleon, had been fighting for three days at Ligny and Quatre 
Bras, and had to lie the night before Waterloo in a wet morass, 
hungry and exhausted. The articles of food that I have named 
are to be procured here at a cheaper rate and of better quality 
than anywhere else in London, only that to enjoy the luxuries, 
wliich I have enumerated at moderate prices, it is first neces- 
sary to gain admittance to the Houses of Parliament, which can 
only be done tlirough a member's order. The chops and steaks 
here are truly magnificent, and on a scale of grandeur commen- 
surate with the architectural pretensions of Westminster Palace. 

Besides all this, away down below the bustle and eloquence 
of the Commons, in those dark, quaint oak passages enclosed 
by marvelous paneling, the visitor is certain to find one of 
the most beautiful bar-maids in London to wait upon him — and 
hand him cold sherry at sixpence a glass. 

This comely damsel liad some tickets to sell. Her uncle — 
I tliink it was her uncle — it was who had broken his leg. He 
belonged to the Noble Order of Foresters, and it was necessary 
that the public should be called upon to make up a purse to 
have the uncle's leg set. I had a benevolent American along 
with me wlio knew not what to do with liis newly cashed sov- 
ereigns, and he listened with a compassionate ear to the tale 
of distress. The result was a small contribution of a half sov- 
ereign to the uncle. 

The bar-maid said, in presence of two of her country friends — 
they came from Ilfracombe, down in the country: "I am so 
much obliged to you, sir. My uncle is very bad. Will you 
have soda and brandy, sir, or will you have a little bitter beer ? 
The bitter beer is very good after a mutton-chop and potatoes. 
Mr. Bright always prefers a glass of sherry when he comes 
down here, but Mr. Disraeli takes brandy and soda. Tlie Hirisli 
members, they are so jolly, and they do carry on so, and they 
make such jokes with us girls. I likes Lord Stanley, the mem- 



MR. BRUCE AND HIS STEAKS. 



279 



ber for Lynn, least of tliem all. Somehow, you can't joke with 
him. He looks awfully sewere, and whenever he speaks it's 
just like a father for all the world. You know, sir, he's got the 
hold Darby blood hintoo 'im, and lie is a great man." 

" Who do you like best in the House of Commons, sissy ?" 
said my frolicsome American friend to the joyous bar-maid. 

" Well, sir, I likes 
Mr. Bruce, tlie 'Ome 
Sekretary, the best 
of hall of them. He 
hassich ahinfluence. 
When he comes down 
here he always takes 
a steak, and he is 
hawful pertikler ha- 
bout it as how it is 
to be cooked. He 
halways likes to have 
one side raw and tlie 
other side burnt. Oh , 
I have been so worri- 
ted about Mr. Bruce 
and 'is steaks — the 
waiters always conies 
to me and says, 'I 
say, wot kind of a 
man is this 'ere 'Ome Sekretary, he ought to get some silk 
binding on to his steaks, he is so werry pertikler.' But he al- 
ways drops 'em a sixpence and that makes it hup." 

The door of the members' entrance to the Commons is 
guarded by two persons in evening dress, who are dignified 
enough in presence and feature to sit in the Senate of tlie United 
States. At each side is a handsomely carved, oaken box, shaped 
like a sentry's hut in camp, and in the sides of these boxes are 
placed notches or racks where all messages and letters for the 
members are left in the charge of the doorkeepers, as no out- 
siders whatever are permitted to penetrate this euti-auce except- 




THE LEGISLATIVE BAK-MAID. 



280 LORDS AND COMMONS. 

ing the Lords or distinguished foreigners, and the latter only 
by invitation of the House itself. 

There are also telegraph offices in the corners of the lobby, 
with stained glass windows, from whence telegrams can be 
sent without delay to the Mediterranean, to Paris, St. Peters- 
burg, New York, Washington, San Francisco, Madrid, Pekin, 
or any place in the bounds of civilization. As I turn from the 
contemplation of these offices, and from the benches where a 
number of messengers and smart-looking and handsomely-uni- 
formed pages are in readiness to rush to the clubs in Pall Mall, 
to the Opera, or to the private residences of the members of 
the House, in obedience to the beck or nod of the "whip" of 
the government, (Sir Henry Brand,) in case of a division,! see 
before me in the doorway a magnificently attired gentleman, 
in black silk stockings, buckled shoes, and powdered hair and 
ruffles, wearing a bright sword at his hip. He looks like a 
picture stepped out of a frame of the period which Thackeray 
loved to dwell upon — when George the Third was king. 

This gentleman is none other than the Sergeant- At-Arms of 
the House of Commons, Lord Charles James Fox Russell, a 
scion of the great house of Bedford, of which Earl Russell is 
a member. How different he looks from the sergeant-at-arms 
of some of our State Legislatures, or even of the National 
Houses of Congress. Here is no promoted bar-keeper or re- 
formed rowdy, but a gentleman bearing one of the proudest 
names in England, and befitting by position and character the 
elevated office which he holds. It is more than easy to believe 
that a slung-shot or revolver could not be pulled upon this gor- 
geous and venerated being while in the performance of his 
august duties. The most malicious derringer would be silent 
in his aAvful presence, and no slung-shot, however moulded, 
could ever impinge that hereditary forehead. 

A story is told of a man who once penetrated even to the 
floor of the House itself, and sat there on the benches, being 
taken for some new member by his colleagues wlio was yet to 
be sworn in. But before the morning broke, the House having 
sat all night, the horror of his position had so paralyzed him 



I 



THE GREAT COMMONER. 



281 



that his jetty hair had turned white. Stay, as I have no ticket 
I will throw myself upon the country and abide the issue. I 
sent in to the Hon. John Francis Maguire, M. P., my card, with 
the written desire that I should be admitted to the gallery, and 
then I awaited the issue, whether for the Tower or the House. 

While I waited, strolling about the gallery, a gentleman 
came out of the door of the Commons, upon whom every eye 
was turned, and walked in an upright, John Bull fashion towards 
the refreshment comiter. A whisper went round the lobby, 
"That is John Bright," and then I knew that for the first time 
I stood in the presence of England's greatest Commoner, the 
apostle of the Manchester school and Tribune of the people. 
I who had seen so many caricatures of the great orator in 
Punchy which has always depicted him as a fat, pursy, A^lgar- 
looking person, sans breeding, sans cercmonie, failed at the first 
glance to identify the noble-looking old man in evening dress, 
with an irreproacha- 
ble white necktie, and 
a decidedly polished 
exterior, who halted at 
the refreshment bar to 
slowly sip a strawberry 
ice after the heat of 
the debate. 

Every inch this was 
a man, as I looked at 
him, and a king among 
men, if the outward 
shell can serve at all 
to indicate what is con- 
cealed within. And he 
has a [)rinccly follow- 
ing too. For around 
him I can see a num- 
ber of men whose names are known wherever the English lan- 
guage is spoken, and wherever English newspapers are printed 
and read, — eager to get a word or a look from him, plain John 
18 




JOHN BRIGHT. 



282 LORDS AND COMMONS. 

Briglit, once the best hated man in England, and now, by 
sliecr force of will and dogged pluck, enshrined forever in the 
admiration, if not the love, of his countrymen. I have as yet 
only been waiting a few minutes when I see approaching me a 
messenger of the House, who points the writer out to a stout, 
compact-looking man in evening dress, of advanced years, fair 
complexion, and with a keen look in his face which seiwes as a 
front to a large, solid head, well set on strong shoulders. This 
is the Hon. John Francis Maguire, M. P. for Cork, author of 
" Rome and its Rulers," " The Life of Father Matthew," "The 
Irish in America," and editor of the Cork Examiner, a man 
well known in Ireland and America, and one of the Irish lead- 
ers of the Liberal side in the House. 

Mr. Maguire has taken the trouble to leave his seat in the 
House during debate to oblige the writer of tMs book, and I 
must here make my acknowledgment for the courtesy done. 
Mr. Maguire hands me a slip of paper which he has procured 
for me from the Right Honorable John Evelyn Denison, Bart., 
Speaker of the House, and this order entitles me to a reserved 
seat on the front bench of the Gallery. I now pass the digni- 
tary in the black stockings and buckles, who smiles most gra- 
ciously at me out of the respect to the Speaker's order, and, 
after traversing a narrow stair, emerge into the Speaker's 
Gallery, and find myself at last inside the English House of 
Commons, of which I have heard so much and so often. 

It is now after dusk, and I can hear the silvery chime of 
" Big Ben " in the huge clock tower of St. Stephen's, as it 
peals the hour of eight through the corridors and galleries. 
Tliere is just now a recess among the members for consulta- 
tion, and but few are on the floor of the House, the majority 
being in the lobby button-holing each other, and the rest, with 
the exception of fifteen or twenty on the seats behind the 
Treasury Bench, are at dinner. 

There are fifty or sixty persons in the Gallery, behind and 
above me, the place where I sit being reserved for those whose 
names have been inscribed on the list of the Speaker. The 
Commons' Galleries run lengthwise on either side of the House, 



HALL OF THE COMMONS. 283 

for nearly a hundred feet, having an upper and lower bench, 
covered with green leather. The House is about forty-five feet 
wide, and one hundred feet long, and the ceiling is over forty 
feet from the ground floor, where the debates are held. It is 
impossible for me to convey an idea of the richness and splen- 
dor of this Hall of the Commons. Suffice to say that there 
is nothing to compare with it in America for architectural 
effect and compactness. 

From above in the ceiling a flood of mellow liglit ix)urs 
through sixty-four stained glass windows, and on either side 
of the House the windows are gorgeous in their designs of 
shields and coats of arms, indicating the living presence of the 
monarchy of Great Britain and Ireland. The numerous gas 
jets are concealed at the top of the glass panelling of the 
ceiling, throwing a brilliant but subdued light upon the Speaker 
as he sits in his high, overhanging oak chair ; on the members; 
on the spectators, and on the ladies who are assembled behind 
the glass screen at the back of and above the Speaker's chair. 
Beneath the Ladies' Gallery, and also behind the Speaker's 
chair, is the Reporters' Gallery, so arranged that each member, 
as he faces the Speaker, shall also face the numerous corps of 
reporters who are in attendance to note down whatever wheat 
may develop itself in the wilderness of chafi" spoken in this 
House. 

The lowest bench on the right hand of the Speaker is de- 
voted to the Ministry, and on this side, immediately above, the 
supporters of the government congregate within hearing dis- 
tance of the Premier, night after night, during the sessions. 
Whenever the Ministerial side is thin of speakers, Mr. Glad- 
stone simply turns around, and a nod or look will bring upon 
his feet whatever member he thinks will best fill the gap. Un- 
derneath the Strangers' gallery is placed a special seat for the 
august Sergeant at- Arms or his deputy, who is, if I mistake 
not, a baronet. The walls and ceiling all round are of stone 
of a peculiar color, which is neither brown, white, grey, nor 
yellow, but is a combination of all four ; and I can best describe 
the tone of color by likening it to the hue of the bronchial 



284 



LORDS AND COMMONS. 



troches or lozenges that are sold in the druggists' shops in 
America. Otherwise I might call it a brownish-grey, of which 
John Ruskin has examples enough and to spare in his " Stones 
of Venice." 

It is certainly a very rich color, and admirably adapted to 
the damp and foggy atmosphere of London. Wherever the 
eye may choose to rest in the Houses of Parliament, it is sure 
to be confronted with the emblazoning of royal and princely 
cognizances. On both sides of the House are the Division 
lobbies, where the members go to be counted by the tellers, 
when a division is called for. Tliat on the west side is for the 
" ayes," and on the opposite side is the lobby for the " noes." 
There are also libraries, residences for all the officers of the 
House, on a scale of the most princely magnificence, and more 
than a score of committee-rooms abutting oif the longest corri- 
dors of any public building in tlie world, not excepting tlie 
Escurial in Spain. Everywhere you may see acres of polished 
oak above and around you. 





CHAPTER XIX. 

LORDS AND C OMIH ON S.— CONTINUED. 



IRECTLY in front of tlie gallery where I am 
sitting, is the Reporter's Gallery. There are 
fifteen boxes for their use to take notes in, each 
reporter sitting separately from his comrade, and writing char- 
acters for dear life. These boxes resemble private boxes in 
our New York Opera House, with the difference that they have 
no roofs above tliem, and are open to the public gaze. Behind 
these fifteen boxes are seats for twenty more reporters, to take 
the place of those in the boxes in turn. Each reporter takes 
short-hand notes for a space of ten to fifteen minutes time, and 
is then relieved by his colleague, waiting above ]iim,who steps 
into his place as the other retires to the Reporter's Room, in 
the corridor, to write out his notes, and thence to take them 
to the newspaper office, or else, if he chooses, he may send 
them by the small boys waiting in the gallery, who are em- 
ployed by the newspapers at a salary of from eight to twelve 
British shillings a week to act as messengers. Late at night, 
it is customary for the reporter who has notes of a very impor- 
tant speech — which he desires to get to the composing-rooms of 
his journal, to take a cab from the Palace Yard, where tlierc 
are dozens of them always waiting, and thus dash off to be in 
time for the press. The Times keeps thirteen reporters con- 
stantly in the gallery during the session, and the Standard as 
many more, if I am not mistaken. These men are all expert short- 
liand reporters, and receive from five to eight guineas per week, 
according to their capability. There is also a man who re- 



286 LORDS AND COMMONS. — CONTINUED. 

mains late to get the gist of what is said and done in debate, 
and from his notes he makes up a clear and comprehensive 
summary for the morning edition. Then there is the "leader- 
writer," "the editor" proper, and a "special reporter," who 
receive cards of admission to that part of the house under the 
Reporter's Gallery, and consequently on the floor of the House 
beliind the Speaker's chair. Tliis is a high favor, and only 
granted most sparhigly, and with discretion. 

There are generally to be found about twenty reporters in 
the gallery, but this number is greatly increased on a " field 
night," when it is usual to find as many as thirty-five or forty 
journalists in the gallery. From what I have seen of these 
parliamentary reporters they seem to be very deliberate in their 
movements, and they do not allow anjihing to hurry them. 
They are nearly all, however, very pleasant gentlemen, and 
with few exceptions, men of experience and scholarly attain- 
ments, two-thirds of them being men who have taken honors 
at the universities, or at Harrow, Eton, or Rugby, and in not 
a few instances they have begun life by taking minor orders 
in the church, and having toyed with journalism for some 
time they were unable at last to resist its feverish fascination. 
Some few of them are in the Inns of Court — embryo barristers 
during the day, and at night they practise short-hand, earn a 
respectable living, and gain experience from England's chosen 
representatives up in their secluded nooks in the gallery of the 
House. It was not always that the press and its reporters had 
such privileges as they now possess in the House of Commons. 

Before the administration of Sir Robert Walpole, there were 
no satisfactory records of the debates in the House. The fierce 
contests between Walpole, "Windham, Pulteney, and others had, 
indeed, for some time before 1740, attracted attention to the 
proceedings of the House, and they had been regularly reported 
in a confused long-hand sort of fashion every month in the 
Gentleman'' 8 and London Magazine, the former publication com- 
mencing the debates in January, 1731, the latter in xVpril, 
1732, but no attempt can be said to have been made to convey 
more than the substance of the speeches until that department 



DR. JOHNSON TAKING NOTES. 287 

of the G-entlemarCs Magazine was intrastcd to grufif old Samuel 
Johnson, in November, 1740. This is the commencement of 
the era of parliamentary reporting in England. Short-hand 
before that time is involved in chaos, and it is doubtful if John- 
son knew anything more than tlie rudiments of the then crude 
system of stenography. 

Indeed, Johnson appears to have given more of his own elo- 
quence than of what had actually been uttered in Parliament; 
but still, what he did was, in all probability, only to substitute 
one kind of eloquence for another — a better for a worse ; or, 
it might be, sometimes, a worse for a better — and therefore, 
on tlie whole, the speeches written by him, though less true to 
the letter than those given by his predecessors, may be received 
as a more living, and, as such, a truer representation of the 
real debates than had ever before been produced. 

He would not take the trouble to or be guilty of the ab- 
surdity of expending his lofty rhetoric upon the version of a 
deljate or speech which had not really attracted attention by 
that quality, but I suppose he reserved his strength for occa- 
sions on which those who had heard, or heard of, the original 
oration, would look for somethings more brilliant tb.an usual. 
It was not, however, until after a long and severe struggle, witli 
a desperate fight at the close, that the right of reporting tlic 
debates of Parliament was gained by the English press of tliat 
day. It is only about one hundred and thirty years ago, (in 
the old days of the Hanoverian and Pretender's troubles), since 
anything spoken in the House was allowed to be printed until 
after the session was dissolved. The House, in its wisdom, 
denounced any earlier pul)lication of the eloquence of the hon- 
orable memliers as a daring act of illegality. 

On the 13th of April, 1738, the House resolved " that it is an 
high indignity to, and a notorious breach of the privilege of this 
House, for any news matter or letters, or other papers, as minutes, 
or under any other denomination, or for any printer or pu))lisher 
of any printed newspaper of any denomination to presume to 
insert in the said letters or papers, or to give therein any ac- 
count of, the debates or other proceedings of this House, or any 
committee thereof, as well during the recess as the sitting of 



288 LORDS AND COMMONS. 

Parliament, and that this House will proceed with the utmost 
severity against such offenders." The House of Commons, it 
is needless to say, has progressed somewhat since that day. 

The monthly magazines, notwithstanding the resolution of 
the House, still continued to print the debates, although for 
some time thoy took the necessary precaution of indicating the 
speakers by fictitious names, to which they furnislied their 
readers with a key when the House became dissolved. But it 
was not until the year 1771, nearly a century ago, that the de- 
bates began to be given to the public day by day as they occur- 
red, and then the attempt gave rise to a contest between the 
House and the newspapers, which occupied the House, to the 
exclusion of all other business, for three weeks, when a com- 
mittee was appointed, whose report, when it was read two 
months after, suggested whether it might not be expedient to 
order that the offending parties should be taken into the cus- 
tody of the Sergeant-at-Arms. Edmund Burke compared the 
decision, in his own brilliant manner, to the resolution of the 
bewildered convocation of mice, — that the cat, to prevent her 
doing future destruction, should have a bell hung to her neck, 
but forgot to say how the rash act was to be performed. Well, 
that is all past and gone now, and the only complaint made in 
these busy days by members of Parliament against the score 
of daily newspapers, published in London, is tliat they err in 
not printing enough of the speeches to satisfy each individual 
representative. 

I noticed that the majority of the parliamentary reporters 
in the Gallery were consideralily advanced in age, many of them 
wearing gray hairs, and fully sixty per cent, of tlie whole num- 
ber that I saw were above forty years- of age. Some of these 
gentlemen, by careful saving and strict attention to their ardu- 
ous professional duties, have amassed comfortable competencies, 
and some of them own, in the environs of the city, snug little 
houses, with snug little libraries, and in some of them, I can 
certainly say, are to be found pleasant tables and home-comforts 
rarely possessed by their brethren of the note-book, and pencil 
in America. There are, to be sure, many improvident ones in 



THE CLERK OF THE HOUSE. 289 

Louden, as elsewhere, and here Bohemiaiiism lias a lower 
depth than it ever was known to have in America, for it is here 
that the really depraved and abandoned Bohemian confines 
liimself exclnsively to the consumption of gin — raw and simple 
gin. A low London Bohemian is a mere animal, and will beg 
a copper from you in the same breath that he professes his 
willingness to translate a Greek tragedy— to oblige the giver 
of the copper, or else he will favor you with an account of his 
days at Oxford or Trinity, when he was a "first honor" man 
or a B. A. But one thing I have not found as yet in London 
on the press, and that is an illiterate or badly taught man, such 
as can be met with by the score on the American press. 

The House to-night is in a Committee of the Whole on the 
Scottish Education bill. The Ministerial benches are pretty 
well filled, while the Opposition benches, to the loft of the 
Speaker's chair, are but thinly populated. Fronting the 
Speaker's chair of state is a table of polished mahogany, the 
surface of which is about ten feet wide by fifteen feet long. 
Directly before the chair of the Right Honorable Speaker are 
two low-seated chairs of less pretension, occupied by the Clerk 
of the House of Commons, Sir Denis Le Marchant, and his as- 
sistant, Sir Thomas Erskine May, K. C. B. The former is a 
smooth-faced man, haviiig the inevitable wig upon his head, 
which gives him a much older appearance than his years would 
warrant. His shoulders are enveloped in an ample black silk 
gown, and a blank book of large dimensions is open before 
him upon whose leaves he is supposed to enter the minutes of 
the House. This person has a magnificent suite of apartments 
in a ^\ing of the Parliament House, beside a very large salary, 
and is as comfortably lioused as if he belonged to the royal 
blood of Britain. Sir Thomas Erskine May, K. C. B., seated 
upon his left, is a clean-shaved gentleman in evening dress, 
who also has apartments in tlie palace, and a good salary. He 
has nothing remarkable about his jx^rson or manner, with the 
exception of a very drawling voice and a hesitancy in announc- 
in"- motions made by the members, or in calling a division 
when the House so wills it. He is the author of tlie eontinua- 



290 



LORDS AND COMMONS. 



tion of Hallam's Constitutional History of England. Beside 
these high officials there arc four " Principal Clerks," one of 
whom, like Sir Thomas May, enjoys the high dignity of a Knight 
Companion of the Bath, &c. Then there are twelve " Assistant 
Clerks" and twelve "Junior Clerks," with an "Accountant," 
an "Assistant Accountant," a "Private Secretary to the Chair- 
man of Ways and Means;" a " Sergeant-at-Arms," who is a 
Lord ; two "Deputy Sergeants;" a "Chaplain," no less a man 
than Canon Merivale, the accomplished Roman historian, who 
has the good sense to make his prayers at the c »mmcncement 
of the proceedings very short; a "Secretary to the Speaker;" 
a "Librarian," a poor cadet of the great overshadowing family 
of Howard; an "Assistant Librarian," with an Irish name ; 
two " Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills," one of whom 

is Mr. R. D. F. Pal- 
grave, of whom 
Americans have 
heard, and finally a 
"Taxing Officer," be- 
side innumerable ser- 
vants, of superfine 
bearing, correct even- 
ing dress, and con- 
summate self-posses- 
sion. I asked one of 
these ponderous ser- 
vants, whom at first 
sight I took to be the 
"Juke of Linsther," 
as an Irisli reporter 
pronounced it, if he 
was not awed by the 
dignity of the house. 
"Aw," said he, in 
a gracious manner, "youer, I precszhume, en Eemircken. 
Tliis sawt of tiling boaws me 'orrid ; it docs. I hcv dun hit for 
licit yeers. I wish they wud adjoan, and I wud go to my club.'' 




COULD YOU MAKE IT A TANNER'? 



THE SPEAKER AND HIS WIG. 291 

Timidly I offered this gorgeous being fourpence, expecting 
to be rebuked in a dignified manner for my presumption by the 
personage who talked so fluently of " 'is club." He never 
turned around, but, gazing steadily at the Speaker's chair, as 
if he was desirous of catching the Right Honorable Gentle- 
man's eye, thrust his hand behind him, counted the pennies 
with his fingers, and said to the writer in a stage whisper : 

"Would your 'onor pleese to make it a 'tanner'? We 'ave 
no perkisites in the Commons, pleese." Let me here state that 
a "tanner" is the slang term for sixpence, and a "bob" is a 
shilling among the London cockneys, servants, bar-boys, and 
wild children of the thousand streets and lanes of London. 

When the House is in committee it is not the custom for the 
Speaker to be present. When the House is in open session, 
then the Speaker is arrayed in wig and gown, and he sits far 
back in the recesses of his chair, like some dried-up mummy, 
so closely is he swathed and covered. It is pretty hard work 
for a member to actually catch his eye, being so muffled up 
as to defy recognition by a casual observer. Yet it is a part 
and parcel of the British Constitution, that this Right Honor- 
able John Evelyn Dennison should bo smothered in this huge 
box and gown and wig on a warm August night like this. 
During committee proceedings the Speaker may walk out, doff 
his wig and gown, and dine as he has done to-night, and then 
come back, and finding the House still in committee, he will 
seat himself in his chair without his legal vesture. 1 have 
been in this House four nights, and this is the first time that I 
have seen the Speaker's legs — palpably. He lolls back without 
any of that reverence that I have heard so much of, as Ijelong- 
ing to the Commons, and he has at last gone to sleep, like Mr. 
Greeley under Dr. Chapin's sermons. Li the meantime, the 
bill, which has twenty-five clauses or sections, is being can- 
vassed and considered by the members who stream in, now that 
the dinner hour has passed. 

While the Speaker slumbers in a quiet way, the chief and 
assistant clerks of the House conduct the business, the assis- 
tant taking up the bill, and repeating as he reads each clause 



292 



LORDS AND COMMONS. 



in detail : " It is moved," or " it is proposed that a substitute," 
or that the "word instead of ," and so on, in sopo- 
rific tones, for two long hours. A number of people in the 
gallery are gently dozing, aud visibly many of the messengers 
are relapsing into a blissful repose. 

The Speaker's table 
is covered with reports, 
large bound and gilt 
volumes, books of ref- 
erence, pamphlets, 
newspapers, costly ink- 
horns, and other cleri- 
cal paraphernalia of 
the state service. The 
huge guilded mace of 
the Speaker, which lies 
on the further end of 
the table below his 
chair, when the House 
is not in committee, is 
now pendant under the 
table on a rack, to show 
that it is not an open 
session for the intro- 
duction of new measures or for the making of set speeches. 

Out of six hundred and seventy or eighty members of the 
House, there are not present to night more than one hundred 
and fifty. Many of the remaining members are scattered all 
over the Continent in nooks and corners. A large number 
may be found on the Parisian boulevards ; some are at Fon- 
tainebleau ; some in the Pyrenees, swallowing chalybeate 
waters ; many are yachting in the Mediterranean, or wasting 
their time with the peasant girls in Isles of the Greek 
Archipelago; not a few are otT at the races at Goodwood or 
Brighton ; some are at Rome, burning, fuming, and cursing the 
garlic and salads ; dozens of them are at Constantinople, at 
St. Petersburg, or climbing the Alps out of a sheer love of 




THE SPEAKER OP THE HOUSE. 



DIGNITY OF THE HOUSE. 293 

danger and the reckless fondness of physical excitement inborn 
in the Englishman ; and probably as many as could be numbered 
on the fingers of the hand are scattered over the American 
Continent in search of novelty. There are also a number of 
City members absent, in tlieir out-of-town residences, compel- 
led to forego forensic honors, at the command of wife and 
daughters who are packing and poking preparatory to a flight 
to the Rhine and Germany. The ministerial benclies show a 
good front for the late season ; first, because the government 
has a great deal of unfinished business on its hands, which 
must be transacted before Parliament is closed ; and secondly, 
because the exertions of the government whip have been most 
arduous in hunting up Mr. Gladstone's supporters, and com- 
pelling them to remain in their seats, while tliere is work to 
be done by them. 

With a great number of Americans, that have not visited 
England, there is in some way or another an abiding impres- 
sion that the House of Commons is the most stately and dig- 
nified legislative body in the world. To be disabused of this 
notion it is only necessary for an American to sit during a 
night session in the gallery of the House, with a proviso that 
he has been a visitor at some time or another to the Senate 
Chamber or the House of Representatives at "Washington. 
When a member of this House rises to claim the attention of the 
Speaker, it is common to find half a dozen of his fellow members 
rising also with him for the same purpose. A member of the 
government gets on his honorable legs with his face turned 
toward the Speaker. If on the lower bench, he will walk a little 
forward to the table, and if he is accustomed to speak from 
notes, it is more than possible that he will lay one hand on the 
table and with the other turn the leaves of his manuscript. If 
he speaks extemporaneously, he will probably lean in a loung- 
ing position forward, his two hands resting on the Speaker's 
table. 

Many of the members who are best known to the public have 
this fashion, and it is most unpleasant to hear them drawl forth 
sentence after sentence as if they were dragged from their 



294 LORDS AND COMMONS. 

honorable throats by sheer force. It has often been reported 
by English writers that American legislators have a bad fashion 
of elevating their legs and laying back in an irreverent attitude 
while listening to a debate. Also, that they expectorate freely. 
Well, I have seen the most distinguished statesman at present 
in England — I mean Mr. Gladstone — lounge and disperse his 
limbs, while within ten feet of the Speaker, in a fashion that 
would bring shouts of laughter from a crowded theatre, were 
the same thing done in a farce or low comedy. 

Each member of the Commons, as he walks into the House, 
to-night, has his hat on his head. As he passes the Speaker's 
chair, he doffs it for an instant, but when he takes his seat the 
hat is replaced upon his head as before. As a general thing, 
a member who speaks without notes, addresses the Speaker, 
with his hat in one hand. They all seem to conclude whatever 
remarks they have to make with a jerk, and as soon as they sit 
down the hat is again replaced, or rather slapped on the head, 
with a vehement motion that seems impelled by some hidden 
mechanical power. Then they have a fashion of lounging in 
and out in a free-and-easy way during debate, that is highly 
suggestive of a bar-room in a frontier town. 

There is rarely, or never — in the House of Commons — an 
exhibition of the nervous, impassioned speaking which may be 
heard all over America or in the Corps Legislatif. When there 
is a clear or telling speech made, (as far as the manner of de- 
livery goes,) — mind, I do not speak of its effect practically — 
or if the eloquence is of a florid description, it will be surely 
spoken by one of the one hundred and five Irish members. 
Certainly, when Whalley or Newdegate get on their legs, to 
smash the Pope or to recount horrible but dramatic stories 
about the mysteries and child massacres of convents, there is 
no lack of vehemence and buncombe. But this style of oratory 
is confined to a few of the members who have hobbies to ride, 
and who cannot be driven from them even at the point of the 
bayonet. 

Pliysically speaking, a majority of the members are gallant- 
looking fellows, and they are all dressed simply, but with the 



AMBASSADOR LAYARD. 295 

taste always observed by a gentleman in the selection of arti- 
cles of clothing. A small number of them wear white beaver 
hats, and their trowsers are cut widely at the bottom in the now 
prevailing fashion. With the exception of a few of the younger 
and more fashionable members, who frequent the race-courses, 
tlie Opera, — go to liear Schneider, lounge into the Cremorne 
after eleven o'clock at night, or frequent tlie society of such 
famous demi-reps as " Mabel Grey," " Baby Hamilton," " Baby 
Thornell," or other women who have beggared and ruined 
hundreds of those young men about town who have a dispo- 
sition to be fast, there is a total absence of showy or loud 
colors in their apparel. A great many of the "fast" young 
men attend the session — occasionally — for the sake of common 
decency, or because their constituencies compel it, as in the 
case of a City borough the other day, where a member was 
rebuked by a public resolution of condemnation and asked to 
resign, for al)sence from his seat. Younger sons of noble lords 
look upon the House of Commons as a necessary evil, which 
must be " done," like an occasional visit to church, or to Rich- 
mond, or Greenwich, to eat fish. 

As the members come in one by one and take their places 
on the benches, I find opportunities to observe and note their 
peculiarities and looks. That gentleman who comes in so 
slowly and so quietly, dressed in dark clothes, and having a 
head, whiskers, and general resemblance to our Longfellow, is 
the Right Honorable Austin H. Layard, Commissioner of Public 
Works, one of tlie Ministers, but not a member of the Cabinet, 
and lately appointed English Ambassador to Spain. You 
would take him for a literary man or a thinker, anywhere, by 
reason of his long, flowing, white hair and thoughtful look. 
Mr. Layard is the author of the celebrated book on Nineveh. 
He receives attention in the House always when he rises to 
speak of Eastern affairs. He was at one time an attache of 
the English embassy to the Porte, and was Under Secretary 
for Foreign Affairs in the administration of Earl Granville. 
Mr. Layard has the reputation of being rather hot tempered in 
debate, and at one time he earned the ill-will of the aristocratic 



296 LORDS AND COMMONS. 

faction in the House by his persevering liberalism, but at pres- 
ent he is popular enough, and no one can look at his bright 
dark-blue eye and general appearance, without feeling that he 
is in the presence of a man who possesses a considerate and 
calmly philosophical spirit, broken at times by a sudden flash 
of the scholar's enthusiasm. 

That gentleman with the exquisitely carved face and very 
red hair, with a slight dimple in his chin, and clear, frank eyes, 
is the Secretary of State for War, the Right Honorable Ed- 
ward Cardwell, M. P. for Oxford City, and an old follower of 
Sir Robert Peel. He has in his time held various offices of 
trust under different administrations, and in June, 1866, when 
the forces of Col. William R. Roberts, President of the Fenian 
Brotherhood, invaded the Canadas, Mr. Cardwell, as Secretary 
for the Colonies, had his hands full of a rather difficult business, 
which he managed as well as the very annoying circumstances 
— for a British Crown Minister — would permit. I like to heg-r 
Mr. Cardwell speak. He is always ready, yet deliberate, and 
with these qualities he possesses a happy and easy manner in 
argument. The most difficult job of Mr. Cardwell's life was 
the management of the Governor Eyre-Jamaica business, 
which at its crisis covered the English administration with 
shame and ignominy. Mr. Cardwell had, while at Oxford, a 
very good reputation, which he has not as yet contradicted by 
his course in Parliament, of which body he was returned as a 
member as early as 1842. Thackeray once ran against him 
and was defeated. 

That really handsome young gentleman, who is said to have 
the best-shaped leg in the House, as well as the friendship of 
the most charming female members of the aristocracy, as he 
certainly is the owner of a most beautiful head of hair, of the 
hue of a new guinea, such as is seen in Carlo Dolce's Virgins — 
is the member for Argyllshire, the Marquis of Lome, heir pre- 
sumptive to George Douglas Campbell, eighth Duke of Argyll, 
the Liberal Secretary of State for India in the Gladstone Cab- 
inet, a Privy Counsellor, and a Knight of the Thistle. The 
young marquis, at twenty-five, has the face and skin of a 



LORNE AND CHILDERS. 297 

maiden of twenty, and I could not but observe that his trow- 
sers were of a fashion superior to any otlier known trowsers in 
the House of Commons. I do not know whether the hand- 
some Marquis inherits the Covenanting piety of the Argyll- 
Campbells, his ancestors ; but he bears a wonderful resemblance 
to liis father, the Duke, and among the frescoes in the corridors 
of the House there is one by Copely, entitled the " Sleep of 
Argyll," and I was astonished to notice tlic strong likeness of 
the young Marquis — who passed the fresco at the moment — to 
the face of his illustrious ancestor of two hundred years ago, 
as it was depicted by the artist — lying on a prison pallet. The 
Marquis of Lome, while I was in the gallery, sat behind Mr. 
Gladstone, on an U2:)per bencli, as a Liberal, like his father who 
sits in the Lords. When the hereditary Campbell got up on 
liis well-shaped legs to speak as a Scotch member on the Pa- 
rochial Schools bill, he did it quietly, and in a clear, musical 
voice, tliat seemed to attract attention. 

The ^larquis of Lornc has a very ready delivery, though he 
is not as yet of great account in debate, and he is I believe, 
from all reports, a marvclously proper young man, compelled to 
exist upon about £25,000 a year, which amount "\nll be largely 
augmented when the present Duke is committed to the family 
vaults. 

That big, bulky six-footer, of great shoulders and massive 
limb, wearing tightly fitting clothes, his forehead overshadowed 
with dark, reddish-brown hair, and his whole manner indica- 
tive of pluck and a contest against life-long odds, is the Right 
Honorable H. C. E. Childcrs, member for Pontefract, and First 
Lord of tlie Admiralty, an office that in England somewhat 
resembles the position of Secretary of the Navy of the United 
States, having this difference only — that the First Lord, while 
in his place on the Treasury or Cabinet benches in the House 
of Commons, is compelled to reply to all attacks on the man- 
agement of tlie Navy, and to defend the expenditure and esti- 
mates of that department. He is noAV giving facts from a pam- 
phlet wliich lie liolds in one hand, while he rests his body on 

liis other hand across the table in a negligent manner, as if he 

19 o , , 



298 



LORDS AND COMMONS. 



were more used to roughing it in the bush than supporting a 
minister by a recapitulation of dreary statistics in the House. 

Mr. Cliildcrs was at one time, I believe, a fellow-member 
with Mr. Robert Lowe, of tlie Parliament of Victoria, after 
both of them had exiled themselves voluntarily to the anti- 
podes. Mr. Cliilders only became a member of the House in 
1860, and his rise to eminence was achieved with more than 
American rapidity, in a country where it is a cardinal prin- 
ciple that a man should not receive emolument, honor, or 
position, until he has grown the gray hair of sixty years. 

^ Mr. Cliilders is the 
chairman and director 
also of at least threescore 
of corporations and foun- 
dations of charity of one 
kind or another, and is 
said to be very good in 
figures — a necessary gift 
in a Lord of the Admiralty . 
If his mind is half as big 
as his whiskers, he is 
certainly a genius. The 
hard work of defending ' 
the Gladstone administra- 
tion in detail is usually 
given to Mr. Cliilders, to 
W. E. Foster, M. P. for 
Bradford, or to Mr. Bruce, 
the Home Secretary. In 
all Irish matters, Mr. Chichester Fortescue, the Chief Secre- 
tary for Ireland, is expected to stand by his leader, Mr. 
Gladstone, and he has been of great service to him in the 
Irish Land Bill legislative measures. ^Mr. Cliilders, like the 
young Marquis of Lornc, is a Trinity College, Camljridge, 
man, but not an Eton boy like the former. 

The next noticeable person on the ministerial bench, and by 
all ackno-wlcdged to be one of the ablest men in Parliament, 




s 



riKST LORD OP THE ADMIRALTY. 



THE SATIRICAL LOWE. 299 

is the Right Honorable Robert Lowe, member for London 
University, an Oxford man, and son of a Church of England 
clergyman. London University, which Mr. Lowe represents, 
is the most liberal educational institution in England, and 
grants University degrees to students, irrespective of their reli- 
gious belief. A short time ago the Queen opened tlie new 
London University buildings, which are, I believe, unequaled 
in the metropolis for beauty of design and commodious comfort. 
Mr. Lowe is now in his fiftieth year, and is a member of the 
Gladstone Cabinet, and Chancellor of the Exchequer — the 
office formerly held Ijy his illustrious chief, and one of the 
greatest trust and responsibility in England. 

As an orator Lowe has few equals, and stands in the follow- 
ing order of precedence: Gladstone, — Bright, — Disraeli, — 
Lowe, — according to the best judges. By many he is said to 
be superior to Disraeli in satirical power, although not his 
equal in vehement philippic, and not a few consider him equal 
in logical force to Bright. Yet, with all his al)ility and power, 
he is one of the best-hated pu])iic men in all England, and this 
is said to be the result of his unfortunate proclivity for satire, 
and for a certain unpleasant gruffiiess, that, spite of his educa- 
tion and inward natural courtesy, will break out, and in a min- 
ute demolish the labor of a year of statesmanship. I might 
call ^Ir. Lowe a pure-blooded Albino, as he is first noticeable 
by his bushy white eye-brows, white hair of great length, and 
rather pinkish eye-lids. 

He has a positive, firm chin, a clear eye, and, from tlic'abut- 
ment of his nostril to the corner of his lower lip on either side 
deep ridges extend, giving him in that part of tlie face the 
look of a bon vivant. The eye is very steady, and looks at a 
stranger of doubtful appearance with a sneering way that seems 
to say : " I have to be polite ; but if I choose to think you an 
idiot, it is my owli business." The ears are large, and seem to 
be buttoned back, as if ready for a row on the slightest provo- 
cation. Mr. Lowe is quite near-sighted, and it is said that to 
this defect he owed his release from holy orders, having studied 
for the Church at University College, Oxford. He certainly 



300 



LORDS AND COMMONS. 



1 



would have made a very unpleasant sort of a clergyman for 
some of the lax and rather immoral public men who illuminate 
the House occasionally. He is a man of many edges, bristling 
all over with sharp and hard angles, and is in every way an ag- 
gressive person. Lord Palmerston, who was with every 
other member of the House — on the footing of a jolly good fel- 
low, could never be brouglit to like Robert Lowe. Lowe never 
laughed at the veteran Premier's jokes. 

Mr. Lowe owes his 
first important ad- 
vancement from an 
ordinary station in life 
to the fact that when 
he returned to Eng- 
land from Sydney, he 
had the good fortune 
to contribute a smasli- 
ing article to the 
Times, and since that 
time Mr. Lowe, it is 
understood, has been 
a regular outside con- 
tributor of that jour- 
nal, witli great good 
luck to back him. Mr. 
Lowe has also the rep- 
utation of being a very 
quick and facile "leader" writer upon the topics with which 
he is best acquainted. 

Mr. Lowe once had liis head well smashed by the roughs at 
an election row, and it is said that the memory of it has stuck 
to him ever since, like the caning of Charles Sumner by Pres- 
ton Brooks, and, like that e])isode, it has served to keep old fires 
burning. Li the memorable debates of 1866, upon the suffrage 
question, Mr. Lowe shone Avith liis greatest force. With such 
rivals as Bright, Disraeli, Gladstone, Hardy, and Milner Gib- 
son, it was no joke to keep on the top of the tide, but Lowe 



II 




JCOBERT E. LOWE. 



THE MARQUIS OP HARTINGTON. 301 

neyer faltered in Lis career. The more pitiless were his ad- 
versaries in argument, the more pitiless became Robert Lowe. 

The fancy, tlic vigor, the antithesis, the irony, wit, force, en- 
ergetic subtlety, and strength of his speeches during that stormy 
session of 186G, are not likely to be forgotten soon, by friend 
or adversary, in the House of Commons. Lowe is, I believe, 
the only instance of a man who has at one and the same time 
a dimpled chin and a bad temper. 

That mild-looking, dark-faced man, with neat attire and 
jeweled fingers, who comes in almost stealthily from behind 
the Speaker's chair, and takes his scat upon the Ministerial 
Bench, is Goschcn, who represents London, and is a member of 
the Cabinet, President of the Boor Law Board, and son of a 
Leipsic bookseller of moderate circumstances. 

Mr. Goschcn is evidently of Jewish origin, and his rise to 
power has been speedy. lie is still a young man — of polished 
'manners, and more than any other member in Parliament repre- 
sents the moneyed interests of the great city for wliich he sits. 
He is a Rugby and Oriel College man, and was at one time 
Vice-President of the Board of Trade, and afterwards Chan- 
cellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. Yet he is scarcely develop- 
ing the statesmanlike power which was predicted for him by 
his friends who had watched his career as a Director in the 
Bank of England, and as the author of essays and treatises on 
some topics of political economy. 

The middle-sized gentleman, inclined to baldness, wearing a 
brown coat and a mixed trousers, with straps at the bottom of 
the latter, and who has a slight fringe of whiskers and a round 
bright eye, is no less a personage than the Manpiis of Ilarting- 
ton, Postmaster-General, a member of the Cabinet, heir pre- 
sumptive to the Dukedom of Dcvonsliire, the Eaiklom of Bur- 
lington, Baron Cavcndisli in Derbysliire and Baron Cavendish 
in York, chiefly celebrated for Ins advocacy of the Confederacy 
in Parliament, and a man of not exceedingly great calil)re as 
a del)ater or thinker ; but from the possessions which he will 
one day inherit in this broad and merry England, a man of 
most decided influence and power. He has for his family mot- 



302 LORDS AND COMMONS. 



1 



to, " Secure in Caution," and generally sticks to it in the 
House. 

In his young days, it is liintcd that the Marquis of Harting- 
ton was in the hal3it of going home very late with his night 
key in his coat-tail pocket, and at one time it is said that the 
notorious "Skittles," (since dead,) had emblazoned on her hand- 
some brougham — presented her by the Marquis — the crest of 
the now steady and religicusly inclined Postmaster-General of 
Great Britain. He is just now conversing with a tall, black- 
whiskered man, of sharp features and equally sharp accent, in 
drab clothing. This is George Armistead, M. P. for Dundee, 
formerly a Russia merchant, and said to be a good man on 
committees. 

A medium-sized, dark-faced, and portly person in black clothes 
walks in slowly by the Speaker and seats himself, with his hat bent 
forward over his eyes, and having a book, whose leaves lie is cut- 
ting, in his hand. This is Alexander James Bcresford-Hope, 
one of the two M. P.'s for Cambridge University — the other 
being the Right Hon. Spencer Horatio Walpole, whose mother 
was Countess of Egmont. 

Mr. Beresford-Hope is part proprietor of that well known 
weekly and satirical journal, the Saturday Revieiv, and is or 
has been a writer for the same sheet. During the Civil War 
in America, ^Ir. Beresford-Hope spoke early and often in sui> 
port of the Confederacy while in Parliament, and also wrote a 
book favoring Jefferson Davis and his cause. In this course 
he had no more ardent colleague than the gentleman who now 
approaches him with his head moving from right to left, in a 
nervous fashion — I mean William Henry Gregory, member for 
Galway. 

Mr. Hope is no doubt a good liver, and is a member of the 
Carlton, Athenaeum, University, Oxford and Cambridge, and 
New University Clubs, where, possibly, he has a great oppor- 
tunity to study cookery as a fine art. His fellow member from 
Cambridge, who stands toying with his watch chain and drum- 
ming on the floor, bears tlie imposing name of Spencer Wal- 
pole, and has no decided individuality in the House. Both 



I 



PEERS IN THE GALLERY. 303 

Hope and Walpole are Conservatives, and arc sadly shocked at 
the continued majorities of Mr. Gladstone. 

The man just now speaking from notes is Lieutenant-Colonel 
Sir Robert Anstruther, of the Grenadier Guards, member for 
Fifeshirc, a Harrow man, and an earnest liberal of the Scotch 
stamp. 

The little old man in evening dress, pale face, and having a 
circle of white beard around his throat, who is playing with 
his fingers nervously, is The O'Conor Don, member for Ros- 
common, who is looked up to by all the Irish members. 

The slender young gentleman, not yet in his twenty-fifth 
year, and very fashionably dressed, leaning up against the back 
of the Speaker's chair in conversation, is Henry George, Earl 
Percy, son of the Duke of Northumberland, who married the 
eldest daughter of the Duke of Argyll, and will one day be the 
proprietor of the second proudest title in England as well as 
of half a dozen castles, a score of manors, and three or four 
baronies. This young man was sent to the House of Com- 
mons by his father, the Duke of Northumberland, as a Con- 
servative, but it is rarely that he takes the trouble to open his 
lips in debate. He has a very great reputation for driving tan- 
dem, and is known to be a judge of boquets and claret — young 
as he is as a legislator in the House of Commons — but he bears 
a good reputation, and has not done anything to dishonor the 
proud name of Percy as yet. 

That young gentleman with tlie pointed yellow moustache 
and goatee of the Vandyke type, is Sir David Wcddcrburn, of 
an old Scotch family, and quite an active working young mem- 
ber of the opposition when led by Disraeli. Very often the 
peers of the Upper House may be found in the Commons, from 
motives of curiosity or to get intelligence of the birth of new 
bills before they are sent to the U})pcr House. They have a 
gallery of their own, these peers, and hardly ever trouble the 
floor of the House. 

Occasionally a prelate of the English Established Church 
may be found in the Peers' Gallery of the House of Commons, 
listening to the debates, and to-night there are two bishops in 



304 LORDS AND COMMONS. 

the gallery, one of whom is Dr. Fraser, Bishop of Manchester, 
who is said to be the most practical minded prelate in England. 
Dr. Fraser has a well outlined face and a very compact head, 
with a clear, firm eye. He is big with a scheme for tlic educa- 
tion of the working classes, and looks to be deeply interested in 
the debate. His companion is the Bishop of Peterborough, who 
is acknowledged to be the ablest speaker and clearest tliinker in 
the Englisli Episcopate. Viscount Bury is now on his legs. 
The Viscount is of all tlie speakers I have heard, the very dul- 
lest. He reads from notes which he takes page for page from 
his hat, and I am certain that I never listened to such a 
dreadful monotone as his voice. The Viscount dresses plaiidy, 
and yet he has a Dundreary look, the light side whiskers which 
he wears giving him an affected appearance. The Vicountess 
Bury is a daughter of Sir Allan McNab, and in her younger 
days was a celebrated beauty, and was a toast in fashionable 
society. 

That young gentleman with the slight, downy moustache 
and gloriously handsome face, leaning over the side of the 
Peers' Gallery, is the Marquis of Pluntlcy, a meml^er of the 
House of Lords, and is the first Marquis in rank of tlie Scottish 
peerage. He is only twenty-three years of age, and was mar- 
ried a short time since in Westminster Abbey, the Prince of 
Wales acting as his l)cst man, and all tlie notabilities of the 
court attending. The old, soldierly-looking man wlio is con- 
versing with him and having a white rose in his button-hole, 
whose hair is cropped quite close, is the Earl of Fiiigall, who 
was formerly an officer in the 8th Hussars, and a hero of the 
Crimean war. 

The medium sized gentleman with the thoroughly English 
face, wavy hair, and plain and unostentatious attire, who passes 
behind the Speaker's Cliair for a moment, and then whispers 
to tliat awful dignitary, is the Duke of Richmond, the leader 
of the Conservative party in the House of Lords. The Duke 
is quite popular in England, and has a magnificent park and 
castle at Goodwood, where a race takes place every year, for a 
prize called the " Goodwood Cup." Under the administration 



I 



LORD STANLEY AND THE O'dONOGHUE. 305 

of Mr. Disraeli the Duke held tlie position now occupied by- 
John Bright, who is President of the Board of Trade. 

There was for some time a warm rivalry between the Duke 
of Richmond, Lord Cairns, and the Marquis of Salisbury, as to 
which of the three should lead in the House of Lords, and at 
one time, I believe after the death of the lion-like Earl of Derby, 
Lord Cairns, who used to be an Irish lawyer before he was 
ennobled, had the best chance from his great ability, but the 
high position and family of the Duke carried the day. 

That plain looking man who with a slight inclination to the 
Speaker and doffing his hat, passes out to the Division Lobby, 
is Lord Stanley — now Earl Derby, since the death of his father. 
Lord Stanley, wlio is now in tlie House of Lords, was one of 
the ablest members of the House of Commons, a forcible de- 
bater, a logical reasoner, and a thorough gentleman in all re- 
spects. Lord Stanley entered political life very early, and has 
filled various offices of trust, being successively — Under Secre- 
tary of Foreign affairs in 1852 ; Secretary for the Colonies in 
1858 ; Secretary of State for Lidia in 1858-9, and Secretary 
of State for Foreign Affairs in 18G6-8. 

The tall, dark-haired and handsome looking member who has 
followed Viscount Bury in debate, and who speaks so fluently 
without notes, and whose language and gestures are not with- 
out a certain grace and elegance, is The O'Donoghuo member 
from Tralee, who was going to marry an Earl's daughter in 
order to pay his debts — but didn't. The O'Donoghue chal- 
lenged Sir Robert Peel to fight a duel a few years ago, having 
been offended by some unparliamentary language of Peel's in 
the House, but the latter backed out of the row in a very un- 
dignified manner. 

Lord Stanley having forgot something, comes back to find' 
it, and searches the bench bcliind the spot where The O'Don- 
oghue is speaking from, which rather confuses the Irish orator 
a little — but Lord Stanley apologises at once. By the way, 
Earl Derby is said to be engaged to the Marchioness of Salis- 
bury, wliose husband died a year ago. Tliis will be a late mar- 
riage for both parties, the intended bride being forty-six years of 



306 LORDS AND COMMONS. 

age with five cliildren, the youngest of w-hom is a daugliter 
twenty-two years of age, while Earl Derby is forty-four years 
of age, and very common-place and prosaic in his domestic 
habits. The Marchioness is, I believe, a daughter of Earl 
De La Warr. 

Three men now enter the House and take scats — two in the 
galleries, who are soon joined by a third. Tliis last man is 
the richest noble in England. He is an old man on the brink 
of the grave, and yet he could buy up a dozen of the members 
of Parliament who are fuming and fidgeting below in the fresh- 
ness of good health. It is the Marquis of Westminster, who 
owns half of the borough from which he takes his title, and 
his income I have been told is something like four hundred 
thousand pounds a year. The Marquis is very charitable, and 
has spent over .£100,000 in erecting model tenements for poor 
people in London. Beside the title of Marquis, he also bears 
that of Sir Richard Grosvenor, which is supposed to be derived 
from the French of Gros Yeneur — " Great Huntsman," — some 
of the ancestors of the family having acted in that capacity to 
the Norman Dukes at a remote period. 

The other gentlemen are irl Spencer, the Lord Lieutenant 
of Ireland, a big man with a big head, a big whisker and a 
big look in the face, wearing a big tweed coat ; and the Hon. 
Robert Wcllesley Grosvenor, one of the members for West- 
minster, a Captain in the 1st Life Guards, and belonging to 
the family of the old Marquis of Westminster. He has for his 
colleague who now takes his seat, William Henry Smith, the 
other member for Westminster, who owns the largest news 
agency in the world, at No. 186 Strand. 

And now the Premier is on his legs at last. I had heard 
of Gladstone so often that I was curious to hear his voice and 
look upon his face. Imagine a tall man, six feet in his stock- 
ings, with a massive head, a good strong body, sparse side 
whiskers just whitening with years, a pair of dark eyes, deep 
as an abyss, with the thoughts and struggles of a mighty spirit 
welling up — firm lips and cavernous eyebrows, a massive and 
persistent under jaw, the lines of the face strongly marked 




I 



MR. Gladstone's early life. 309 

and indicating by their rigidness the conflict that has been go- 
ing on inwardly for years, and dress that figure up in deep black 
upper garments and mixed trousers, and you have- something 
like the Premier of Great Britain as I saw him in his seat on 
the end of the Treasury benches in Parliament. One leg is 
tlirown over another in a negligent and thoughtful attitude, the 
head being bowed forward on the breast, while every few min- 
utes he raises his eyes with a wonderful mystery glittering 
in them, to the face of the member who lias the floor, as if he 
were taking the mental measurement of the speaker. The 
face represents a fierce enthusiasm which can kindle into great 
deeds, or express with a glance great thoughts. 

This wonderful man started in life as a High Churchman 
and Tory, believing that all bishops should know Greek and 
acknowledge the Apostolic Succession, and now he is an ad- 
vanced Liberal, but opposes woman's suffrage as a dangerous 
measure. In religion Gladstone sticks to his Oxford teachings, 
and this is best proved by his Episcopal appointments, nearly 
all of whom arc High Churchmen. 

How grandly the sentences roll from the lips of the schol- 
arly Premier, as he stands up to reply to some attack on the 
administration. Every sentence is rounded, full, concise, and 
flowing, and every phrase seems chosen with elegance. He is 
a marvelously brilliant speaker, but it is better to hear him 
than to read his speeches, which though perfect literary com- 
positions, are yet, in type, brilliant and dry abstractions, while 
tlie contrary may be said of Bright's speeches, whose produc- 
tions sound better in a report than they do when they are de- 
livered. 

And now he has done, and sits down, slamming his hat on 
his head, and reclining back, with his eyes glued on his shirt 
bosom ; and from the Opposition benches at the other side of 
the House, a tall, massive figure, which is radiant with jewelry 
and surmounted by a poll of black curly hair, rises to answer 
Mr. Gladstone. The face is corrugated, the nose like an eagle's 
beak — curved — like those on Roman coins, or just such a nose 
as Titus encountered by the thousand, under piercing, almond- 



310 LORDS AND COMMONS. 

shaped black eyes, in the Court of tlic Holy of Holies, when 
the Chosen People fell in heaps behind their shields, only glad 
to die for Jerusalem. 

Yes, licre is one of that same wonderful, plucky race, which 
has survived hundreds of years' of war, pestilence, famine, per- 
secution, and contumely, and now finds its best representative 
in Benjamin Disraeli, the author of" Tancred," " Coningsby," 
" Henrietta Temple," and "• Lothair," that book of books. This 
is the same Jew whom O'Connell thundered at thirty years ago, 
and whom he denounced as the lineal descendant of the impen- 
itent thief who died upon the Cross. Thirty-three years ago 
this man entered Parliament and made his maiden speech, or 
attempted to make it, — as a member from Maidstone. The 
crowded House laughed at him tliat night, — men who were used 
to Canning, and Henry Brougham ; to that consummate orator, 
Daniel O'Connell, and to the brilliant fireworks of Richard La- 
lor Shiel, — laughed at the young member with the Jewish beak 
and profile, and he sat down discomfited, but not beaten, cry- 
ing out to the House, which was indulging in cock-crowing and 
geese-cackling at his expense, " You will not hear me now, but 
you shall hear me yet." 

He is an older man now, and success in everything he has 
attempted, such as has never been given to any living man but 
Louis Napoleon, has rewarded his efforts. Hear liow he dashes 
into Gladstone's eloquent sentences with his biting, withering 
words of sarcasm, — how he overthrows the airy edifice which 
the Liberals were just now contemplating, — listen to the fiery 
words of this master of wit and trenchant, cutting invective — 
invective that spares no feeling or cherished opinion, but bares 
the breast of the Minister like the surgeon's hand to plunge 
still deeper the scalpel in the roots of the wound. 

Now he has done, and he sits down, and members crowd 
around him and congratulate him, but he receives their incense 
with a wearied, indifferent air, that seems to say, " I have been 
Premier myself, and I think it to be a small place for a man 
of ability." 

And so the night passes on in the House, member after 



DANIEL O'CONNELL. 311 

member getting upon his honorable legs, and the small hours 
come on apace, and the small tallc continues, and the Speaker 
comes in and goes out, yet still the House remains in Com- 
mittee — a very wearisome night it is, and hot and close in the 
galleries, and many sleep the sleep of exhaustion in the legis- 
lative arena — while off in green fields and on grassy meads, 
by lakes and rivers, the dew falls heavily, and the English Moon 
shines with a soft light all over the broad land. 

It is amusing to see the Speaker of the House settle a point 
of order wlien members become obstreperous, with his little 
cocked hat in liis hand, or to see him reprimand a member who 
crosses the horizon of a member who is addressing tlic House. 
This last offence is considered a great breacli of etiquette, and 
the Speaker always instructs tlie offender that he should have 
made a tour around the House to avoid giving offence to the 
orator. Sometimes a tired member will notice tliat there is not 
a sufficient number of members in the House to transact busi- 
ness, and if he wishes to escape a threatened monstrous de- 
bate, he must notify the Speaker that there is not a quorum 
present. Perhaps the Speaker may desire to rush some busi- 
ness through, and he will therefore have to be notified several 
times before he will take warning to count the members, which 
he does at last with slow reluctance. 

It has been the privilege of any member (from time immemo- 
rial,) to inform the Speaker that there are strangers in the gal- 
lery, meaning ladies, reporters, or any one who is not a member 
of Parliament. When so notified, the Speaker, by tliis musty old 
rule, is compelled to order tlie strangers to leave the House. 
Thirty years ago Daniel O'Coimcll quarreled with the London 
Tiynes, and that paper in revenge would not print his speeches. 
O'Connell determined to be even with tlie journal, and when- 
ever he saw a Times' reporter in the gallery, he would cry out, 
" ]\Ir. Speaker, I beg to call your attention to the fact that there 
are strangers in the gallery." Then the Sj>eaker would order 
the galleries cleared, and the Times' reporters had to take their 
note books and marcli off disgusted. It was not long before 
the Times gave in and stop^^cd the fight, and O'ConncU's 



312 LORDS AND COMMONS. 

speeches were reported with fidelity. This has always been re- 
garded as a joke of O'Connell's, but I see that lately a Scotch 
member named Craufurd, who represents the town of Ayr, and 
is also editor of the Legal Examiner, has been putting O'Con- 
nell's joke in practice. 

--'' Miss Florence Nightingale, Miss Lydia Beckett, and MissB 
Harriett Martineau, as well as many other well known ladies, 
have been for some time working with great zeal for the repeal 
of the act which licenses prostitution in garrison towns. Many 
members of the House are opposed to the repeal of the act, and 
consequently when the question of repealing it came up in 
the House, and just as the debate had opened, the member 
for Ayr, Mr. Craufurd, rose and said, " Mr. Speaker, I beg to 
call your attention to the fact that there are strangers in the 
gallery," pointing to the gallery where a few ladies had 
placed themselves, for the purpose of hearing a question of so 
much moment to their sex, discussed. The Speaker and many 
members urged Mr. Craufurd not to look that way, and to per- 
mit the obnoxious persons to stay where they were ; but with 
Scotch obstinacy he insisted, and Mr. Bouverie upheld him in 
it, saying, " 1 believe it is an undoubted rule of the House, sir, 
that if an honorable member does notice the presence of 
strangers, the galleries are cleared." Accordingly they were 
cleared ; the reporters, as well as the ladies, were put out, and 
then the debate went on for several hours. At the close of 
this, the Prime minister, Mr. Gladstone, got up and lectured 
Mr. Craufurd for his ill timed modesty, telling him that the 
feeling of the whole House was against him. The del)ate was 
therefore adjourned, by a strong vote of 229 to 88, to come up 
again in the presence of reporters, and most likely, of such 
strangers of either sex as may choose to come in. 

The House of Lords is the Upper House of Parliament ; in 
England all bills that are born in the Commons have to be con- 
firmed by the Lords and signed by the Queen, l)cfore they be- 
come part of the statutory law of the land. There are about 
four hundred of these legislators in the House of Peers, for it 
must be understood tliat every nobleman does not sit by right 



DUCAL HOUSES. 013 

ill the House of Lords. In many families the privilege is hered- 
itary, and generation after generation a family is i*e})re8eiited by 
the oldest son, who, on the death of his father, takes the scat 
made vacant in the Lords. The highest rank of noljility in 
England is that of Duke. There are eighteen nobles wlio ei> 
joy tlie Ducal dignity in England, two in L-eland, and six in 
Scotland, They are as follows : 

English Dukes. — Norfolk, Somerset, Richmond and Lennox, 
Grafton, Beaufort, St. Al])ans, Leeds, Bedford, Devonshire, 
Marlborough, Rutland, Manchester, Newcastle, Nortlmmber- 
land, Wellington, Buckingham and Cliandos, Sutherland, and 
Cleveland. 

Irish Dukes. — Leinster, Abercorn. 

Scotch Dukes. — Hamilton and Brandon, Buccleuch, Argyll, 
Atliole, Montrose, and Roxburghe. 

There is only one Duchess in her own right — the Duchess of 
Inverness, wliich is a Scotch title. On state occasions Dukes 
wear velvet robes and ducal caps of state, with strawberry 
leaves in gold. 

A stranger addressing one of these Dukes, has to begin his 
letter as follows : 

" My Lord Duke, may it please your Grace." And in state 
proceedings a Duke is styled "High, Puissant, and Nolile 
Prince." There are Dukes and Dukes. Dukes of tlie royal 
blood are still higher in rank than the noble Dukes. Tlie 
eldest son of the reigning monarch always bears the title cf 
"Prince of Wales." The eldest daughter is called the "Prin- 
cess Royal." This princess is married to the Crown Prince of 
Prussia. These two dignitaries, according to court etiquette, 
are served by tlie attendants, wlien at table, on bended knees 
with uncovered heads. Those admitted to kiss their liands 
must also kneel. In the House of Lords, when the Queen is 
present, the Prince of Wales, as heir apparent, sits on the right 
hand of Her Majesty, while Prince Albert always sat on her 
left hand. Tlie younger sons of the Queen, when they are 
Peers, sit on the left hand of the throne, but after the father 
dies, they sit below the Wool Sack, (a huge fiery red bed-tick 



314 LOllDS AND COMMONS. 



n 



full of wool, on whicli the Lord Cliancsllor takes it easy when 
the Lords are in session,) on the bench assigned to the otlier 
Dnlvcs. 

Tlie Prince of Wales, when on his throne, wears a rolie of 
ermine, a cape of ermine, and a red velvet cap, with a gold tassel 
over a gold crown, ornamented with pearls. The younger sons 
and daugliters have no diamonds, pearls, or crosses surmount- 
ing their diadems — unlike the Prince of Wales. 

The three highest subjects after the Queen and the Royal 
Family in England, are : First, The Lord Archbishop of 
Canterbury. Second, Tlie Lord High Chancellor of England. 
Third, The Lord Arclibishop of York. The Archbishop of 
Canterbury, wlio is Primate of England, is styled in public 
documents, and he also writes himself, "The most Reverend 
Father in God, the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, by Divine 
Providence." The Archbishop of York signs himself, "By 
Divine Permission," as do all the other Bisliops. There are 
only two Ecclesiastical Provinces in England, those of York 
and Canterl)ury, and two Archbisliops. Li the House of Lords 
the Archbishops and Bishops, (excepting the Irish Bisliops now 
disfrancliised,) sit as Spiritual Peers, and the two Archbishops 
wear Ducal Coronets — tlie Bishops wearing fillets of gold on 
their heads, with pearls and jewels. The Bishop of Sodor and 
Man, and • the junior Bishops have no scats in the House of 
Lords. A Bishop ranks next to a Viscount. The nobility of 
Great Britain own three-fifths of the landed property of the 
Kingdom, while starvation and want run riot in the land. 

England is studded with parks, villas, castles, game preserves, 
rabbit warrens, trout streams and deer parks, all of which are 
held by right of primogeniture. No poor man can enter these 
beautiful ancestral domains, and the severest penal punish- 
ments are meted out to those poor wretches who dare to in- 
fringe on the game laws. 

The English nobility are not cowardly or treacherous, but 
many of the younger members are very corrupt, extravagant, 
and reckless, and no dcmbt in time their order will pass away, 
for they are out of place in this century. 



PRIVILEGES OP THE PEERS. 315 

England has nineteen Dukes, seventeen Marquises, one 
hundred and three Earls, one Countess (widow of an Earl), 
nineteen Viscounts, one Viscountess, and one hundred and 
fifty-two Barons. 

Ireland has two Dukes, twelve Marquises, sixty-four Earls, 
and sixty Barons, besides twelve Viscounts. When three Irish 
Peers die in succession without issue, one other Irish Peer is 
created to fill the gap. 

Scotland has seven Dukes, four Marquises, forty-four Earls, 
five Viscounts, and twenty-five Barons. The wife of a Duke 
is entitled "Duchess," the wife of a Marquis "Marchioness," 
the wife of an Earl is a "Countess," the wife of a Viscount 
is called a " Viscountess," and the wife of a Baron enjoys the 
title of " Barf)ness." The better-half of a Baronet, which is a 
title bestowed upon fat aldermen and rich manufacturers — being 
a cheap order of knighthood, conferred by the Queen, is called 
*' My Lady This," or " My Lady That," as the case may be. 

The people of England are heartily tired of their nobility, 
and the success of American principles upon this continent has 
a tendency to cause the destruction of this social outrage upon 
the Nineteenth Century. 

Peers, or members of the House of Lords, have many privil- 
eges which others of noble blood do not enjoy. A Peer can only 
be tried for High Treason or murder by his Peers, who com- 
pose the House of Lords, and the trial takes place in a session 
of that body specially convened for that purpose, after the fash- 
ion here described. 

The Peers having taken their seats in full, flowing robes, the 
Lord Chancellor seats himself on the Woolsack in the middle 
of the House of Lords, the Garter-King-at-Arms, in his gorge- 
ous surcoat and tabard, makes proclamation of the offences 
against the culprit Peer. The Lord High Steward puts the 
question to each peer in his seat, after the evidence has been 
heard ; 

" Is the prisoner at the Bar Guilty or Not Guilty ?" 

Then each Peer, rising, says, " Guilty," or, " Not Guilty 
upon my Honor," as the case may be. A Peer cannot be 
20 



316 LORDS AND COMMONS. 

be taken into custody unless for an indictable offence. This is 
also a parliamentary privilege of the members of the House of 
Commons, who cannot be arrested for debt while the House is 
in session, or while attending the proceedings, or going to or 
from Parliament. An old custom of England allows a Peer, 
gomg to or from Parliament, the privilege of killing one or two 
deer belonging to the Sovereign, after he has blown a horn. 
This is very seldom done now-a-days. A Peer cannot be bound 
over to keep the peace, excepting in the Court of Queen's 
Bench. Slander against a Peer is known in the courts as 
scan. mag. and is severely punishable. 

A Peer cannot lose his title of nobility excepting by death, 
or when he has been attainted for High Treason. He is allowed 
to answer to a bill in Chancery upon his word, aiid is not re- 
quired to take an oath. The Sovereign may degrade a Peer 
from his rank for wasting his estate, as in the case of George 
Neville, Duke of Bedford, who had led a dissolute life and had 
squandered all his fortune. He was deprived of his title, hon- 
ors, and possessions, by Edward IV, the latter being forfeited 
to the Crown. If that precedent was followed in these times, 
a great number of scampish young nobles would lose their titles 
and the remnants of princely estates. 

Lately, I believe. Parliament has ordered it so that a Peer 
may be proceeded against for debt, as in the case of the bank- 
rupt Duke of Newcastle. Besides all these manifold privi- 
leges, which exist for the benefit of the nobility, the Diplomatic 
Service is chiefly for their support, and here, as in the Foreign 
Office, fat sinecures are available at all times, for the improvi- 
dent and spendthrift nobles. Some idea of the rich prizes of 
the Diplomatic Service may be got from the following list of 
salaries of the different Ambassadors, Ministers, and Charges 
d'Affaires, at the principal countries with which Great Britain 
holds intercourse. The salaries I give are those of the Minis- 
ters alone, not including the salaries of attaches, and they are 
thus enumerated : 

France, <£10,000; Turkey, £8,000; Russia, X 7, 800; Aus- 
tria, £8,000; Prussia, £7,000; Spain, £5,000; United States, 



SALARIES OF AMBASSADORS. 



317 



.£5,000; Portugal, £4,000; Brazil, £4,000; Netherlands, 
£3,600; Belgium, £3,480; Italy, £5,000; Bavaria, £3,600; 
Denmark, £3,600; Sweden, £3,000 ; Greece, £3,500; Swit- 
zerland, £2,500; Wirtemberg, £2,000; Argentine Republic, 
£3,000 ; Central American Republics, £2,000 ; Chili, £2,000 ; 
Peru, £2,000; Columbia, £2,000; Venezuela, £2,000; Ecua- 
dor, £1,400; Coburg, £400; Dresden, £500; Darmstadt, 
£500; Rome, £800; Persia, £5,000; China, £6,000; and 
Japan, £4,000» 








CHAPTER XX. 

THE LONDON POLICE AND DETECTIVES. 

BOUT ten o'clock in the evening, the rain, 
which had been gathering all day, came 
down in bucketfuls. The gutters ran like 
little rivers, and on Lothbnry and the Poultry, 
and on all the buildings behind the Bank and 
^«s^;l&'^^fe^^" over London Bridge there came down a hot 
steaming log that almost blinded, as the rain poured against 
the faces of those who had to encounter the storm. The rain 
was hot, and the fog had a fetid, sticky odor, that seemed like 
the breath of a graveyard, or a festering corpse in an old vault 
on a hot July day. 

Down below, on the river, all was quiet among the noisy 
Wapping boatmen, and the river below London Bridge looked 
gloomy and vast and dangerous as the entrance to the shades 
of the Inferno. Now and then, through the dense darkness and 
gloom which hung like a tissue over the river, came a whistle, 
eldritch-like, from the funnel of some Greenwich or Chelsea 
steamer, as she grated against the fishermen's barges, that lay 
like huge floating carcasses out on the bosom of the dark river ; 
and anon came the hoarse, drunken shout of some intoxicated 
oyster or herring navigator, who lay in the shadow of Billings- 
gate Market, returned from some Flemish or Scotch port with 
a precious cargo of eels or sprats. London, or the City, seemed 
deserted and lonely. The portal of the Bank was as solemn 
as a churchyard. 

The insurance offices in Bishopsgate and Broad streets, the 
money-changers' and money-brokers' haunts in Leadenhall 



THE OLD JEWRY. 319 

street, and the merchants' desks in Cornhill and Gracechurch 
street, were forsaken. A footfall seemed like an echo of past 
years, and while the water ran in torrents in the gutters, and 
while misery haunted doorsteps and dark passages, seeking 
shelter with dripping rags to hide its shame, the stolid police- 
men walked their rounds and looked sharply through the thick 
fog as cabs dashed by, for the West End, and the noise of the 
horses' feet died away under the arch of Temple Bar. 

"Where the Poultry, Bucklersbury, and Cheapside, form a 
junction, just below the Mansion House, there is a little, nar- 
row, and short street. This street is called the " Old Jewry," 
and it has its outlet in Coleman street and Moorgate street, 
which run in the direction of Finsbury square. Behind the 
Old Jewry is Basinghall street, the Aldermanbury, and Fins- 
bury square. Then there are Milk street. Wood street, Botolph 
street, Pudding lane. Fish street, Mark lane, Lime street, and 
Love lane. In all these narrow causeways, dark passages, and 
crooked sinuosities of brick, stone, and mortar, untold and 
uncounted wealth is hidden away, safely behind bolts and bars. 

These tall, lowering warehouses, with their treasures of spices 
and silks, ingots and bars of yellow metal, where guineas are 
shoveled about all day as if they were plentiful as cherry-pits — 
have a dismal effect this sloppy, stormy night. Then the Old 
Jewry has its memories, some sorrowful and sad enough. Its 
very name a synonym for persecution and torture, a relic of 
steel-clad days and roystering and merciless nights, when the 
tribes of Israel were the playthings of the Gentiles and unbe- 
lievers. 

Here, in this narrow lane, stood the proudest synagogue 
in all England until the year of gi'ace 1291, when the Jews 
were, by edict, expelled the kingdom; and here came the 
Brothers of the Sack, a mendicant order of friars, to take 
possession of the deserted temple, one sunny May afternoon, 
when the orchards were blooming, and the linnets were sing- 
ing in Cheapside — now a mart of all the nations of mankind. 
And then, in the natural order of things, came Sir Robert Fitz- 
walter on another sunny afternoon, to dispossess the Brothers 



320 THE LONDON POLICE AND DETECTIVES. 

of the Sack ; and this doughty knight, having the ear of the 
then King, turned the monks out, and they, invoking the dis- 
pleasure of the Maker of all things upon Knight Fitzwalter, 
banner-bearer to the city and the Lord ]\Iayor of London, left the 
convent and dispersed themselves severally and sorrowfully, all 
over the by-paths and sequestered roads and nooks of merry 
Old England. 

The Old Jewry is about two hundred and fifty feet long. 
Short passages, that cannot be dignified by the title of lanes, 
jut off this narrow street. High buildings loom up to the sky 
above the heads of the passers-by,, and the dome of mighty St. 
Paul's is hid away from the vision. 

In this Old Jewry is a couii>-yard hidden away. There are 
jewelers' shops, silk-mercers' sliops, and chop-houses of the 
better class on either side, and a man, in a blue cloth uniform 
of heavy fabric, walks up and down, day and night, with a 
pasteboard helmet on his head. His wrists are trimmed with 
bands of crimson and white flannel, and one row of gilt brass 
buttons bifurcate his blue, close-fitting coat, and meet to 
part no more at his throat and waist. The face of the man is 
homely, and his black eyes burn under his helmet of a hat, 
and in the glare of the street lamp. Not a soul stirring in 
the Old Jewry to-night but this silent patrol-man, who looks 
up and down the lane, now to Chcapside, now over the roofs as 
if he would like to get a glimpse of St. Paul's, whose bell booms 
with an affrighting suddenness and energy on the air, through 
the beating rain and blinding fog. 

" Is this the Central Detectives' Office?" I ask of the helmet- 
ed patrol. 

" Yes, sir. This 'ere is the Central Hoflfis of the City of 
Luniiun ; the bother hoffis is down Scotland-yard way in Par- 
liament street, hopposite the Hadmiralty and the 'Oss Gy-a-ads." 

I find my way past the patrol, and around me I can see a 
court-yard fifty by a hundred feet in size, and at either side a 
gas-lamp burns dimly, and the wind whistles down from above, 
and the rain patters unceasingly. 

It is like a play-ground or school-yard, but there is in it the 



RELICS OF CRIME. 321 

quietness of a deserted church. Turning to the right, I as- 
cend two steps and enter a hall, where another morose-looking 
patrolman demands my business. 

"Who do you want to see, sir? Oh, Hinspector Bailey. 
Well, sir, he is werry busy just now; got a precious 'ard case 
to desect; but I'll take your card and I'll try wot I can do." 

In a few minutes I am usliered into the presence of the chief 
detective officer of the chief city of England. He sits in a 
room secluded from the main rooms, and as I pass through a 
number of these chambers a squad of men, who are sitting on 
chairs and lounges, look up at me quietly for a second, and, 
not recognizing any one whom they " want," drop their eyes 
immediately. The room in which Inspector Bailey sits is not 
a large one, and there is no superfluity of furniture, but the 
walls are covered with placards offering rewards for the appre- 
hension and conviction of criminals, murderers, forgers, and 
other runaways from justice. Some of these are so curious 
that I nmst give a few of them : 

RING STOLEN — £l REWARD. 

A reward of £l will be paid for information that shall lead to the discov- 
ery of a gold ring, the setting in which was originally arranged for a round 
stone, with about five small teeth or holders to fix the same ; the original 
stone having been lost it was replaced by an oval or pear-shaped rose dia- 
mond, which was loose in the setting. 

The said ring was stolen from a wai'ehouse in the city, on the 14th inst. ; 
and it is requested that any person hereafter ofiering it, for pledge or sale, 
may be detained until the police are informed. 

Information to Inspector Bailey, City of London Police, Detective Office, 
26 Old Jewry : or to the officers on duty at any of the city or metropolitan 
stations. 



£l 10s. REWARD. 

TO CAB-DRIVERS, ATTENDANTS, AND OTHERS. 

INFORMATION WANTED. 

On Saturday, the 17th of April, 1869, about 4.45 in the aflernoon, a four- 
wheeled cab, took up at Messrs. Smith, Payne & Co.'s Banlc, at the end of 
King William street, near the Mansion House, a gentleman, 48 years of age, 
5 feet S-\ inches high, dark brown hair, fresh complexion, scanty whiskers, 
square build, and moderately stout ; with a dark-brown portmanteau, which 



322 THE LONDON POLICE AND DETECTIVES. 



1 



was put inside. He told the driver to take liim to Finsbury square and he 
■would tell him the number afterwards. £l 10s. reward will be paid on the 
required information (as to his destination) being given to Inspector Bailey, 
City of London Police, Detective Department, Old Jewry, E. C. 
London, 8th May, 1869. 

£200 Reward, 
embezzlement. 

Absconded, on Friday, the 5th inst., from the emplojTnent of the Great 
Central Gas Company, 28 Coleman street, London, Benjamin Iliggs, late of 
Tide-End House, Teddington, Middlesex. Description. — About 35 years 
of age, 5 fpet 9 or 10 inches high, black hair, mustache, whiskers, and beard, 
pale complexion, slender build, gentleman-like appearance. Generally 
dressed in black or dark clothes and brown overcoat. Had a large-sized 
dark green-colored leather bag and a small black bag. \ 

The said Benjamin Higgs is charged on a wan-ant with embezzling a 
large sum of money belonging to the above company: and notice is hereby 
given, that a reward of £ 1 00 will be jsaid to any person who will give such 
information as shall lead to his apprehension ; and a further reward of £lOO 
on recovery of the monies embezzled. A photograph of Benjamin Higgs 
may be seen on application at the principal police stations. 

Information to be given to Messrs. Davidson, Carr, and Bannister, So- 
licitors, 22 Basinghall street, E. C, or to Inspector Bailey, City of London 
Police, Detective Department, 26 Old Jewry, E. C. 

London, 18th March, 1869. 

" So you ■would like to see London under its most unfavora- 
ble aspects. You would like to scour it by day and night, Sir. 
"Well, you have a big job on hand, let me tell you, Sir," said a 
cheery voice which came from behind a low desk. This -was 
Inspector Bailey, a very English-looking gentleman, with a 
ruddy oval face, reddish whiskers, — thick and neatly trimmed, 
and wearing a dark-mixed suit of clothes. He had clear blue 
eyes, this cheery-voiced inspector, and did not in any way give 
the idea of a detective, he looked so jolly and well-fed, and there 
was such a humorous, good-natured, twinkle in his eyes. 

"Well," said he, "let us see what's best to do for you, sir. 
I'll give you the best men I have, and I can do no more. I 
suppose you want to see St. Giles ? Well, St. Giles is not 
what it once was. You see they have been rooting up the 
worst holes, and the parish authorities are quite active, and 



MR. funnell's secret. 323 

three new streets have been opened, and a great change has 
come over tlie place. But there's a terrible lot of destitution 
and crime and misery in the City of London still, and you 
can see it all if you have the heart for it. Send up Sergeant 
Moss," said the Inspector to a messenger. 

Sergeant Moss came up from below stairs, a dark-eyed, thick- 
whiskered, good-looking fellow of thirty-five years, dressed 
like a dissenting minister, and trying to look very meek. But- 
ter would not have melted in Sergeant Moss's mouth. He 
wasn't "fly" to what was going on neither. Oh, no ! 

" Sergeant Moss, you will take this gentleman through Rat- 
cliffe Highway and Wapping, and show him the sailors' dens 
and the thieves who haunt Lower Thames street. Give him the 
best chances you can, and look out for Bill Blokey. He's down 
that way to-night, more nor likely, and if you brought him in 
it would be no particular harm to him or you. We got the 
trunk that he broke open and left behind. That will be your 
detail. Send me Funnell up stairs." 

Mr. Funnell came. Mr. Funnell had a very huge beard, 
which hung down on his chest like a door-mat, and a sharp eye 
for business. In fact, he was all business, this cheerful Mr. 
Funnell. He was a first-class detective in London. But he 
had hard feelings against New York. It was no place for Mr. 
Funnell. Mr. Funnell confided to me a secret which I will 
now give to my readers. 

" I wos wonst over in New York. That's a good many years 
ago. That was a long time ago. Yes, a very long time ago, 
in Bob Bowyer's time, when Bob wqs the topper, as we say. 
He wos the 'Awkshaw of the period, wos Bob. I wos awfully 
innocent then, and Bob didn't take the right care of me, and I 
fell into the hands of the Philistines. I went down one day 
to Fulton Market ; I think it's just opposite some ferry where 
you go across, just like Southwark, and you can get very big 
oysters there. Well, as I wos saying, I wos worry innocent, 
and as I wos walking along, thinking of a good many things, 
when one of these fellows I believe you call the gentry on your 
side 'heelers' — dropped a big fat pocket-book at my feet. 



324 



THE LONDON POLICE AND DETECTIVES. 



" Now, mind you, I did not see him drop it, and that's where 
I was taken in. That made the trouble for me. I had never 
seen anytliing of that kind done in England, and of course the 
'heeler' naturally insisted that the pocket-book wos mine. I 
tried to argue with him that the pocket-book wos not mine, but 
the more I argued that way the more he persewered the other 
way. Well, I wos perswaded against my own ideas that, per- 
haps, I might have lost a pocket-book, and the fellow wos so 
blessed positive about it too. So I fell a wictim to the infernal 
scoundrel, and gave him some money for the pocket-book, and, 
of course, the money wos worth nothink, and Bob Bowyer could 
do nothing for me. Ah, New York is a precious bad place. — 
So it is." 




THE POCKET-BOOK GAME. 



" Well, now, Mr. Funnell, as you have done relating your 
sad experiences, you will please do as I tell you. You will 
report to our American friend, or, rather, he will report to you 
early in the morning, and you will take him and show him Bil- 



"piping off." 325 

lingsgate Market before daybreak. You are the best man for 
Billingsgate, I think, and you had better attend to tliat detail." 

"I will meet him there or at the Fish Hill monument, at 5 
o'clock in the morning, if that will do, Sir." 

"That will do very well," said the Inspector. "And now 
we want a man for Smithfield. Who is a good man for Smith- 
field? Let me see," and the Inspector tapped his forehead. 
" I think Ralfe will do for that. He knows the Sraithfield Mar- 
ket best, and he will show you everything, with a knowledge 
of what he is doing. Let Ralfe come up, and Sergeant Scott 
and AVebb. I want to speak to them." 

Ralfe, or Dick Ralfe, as he was called, was a good-looking 
young Englishman, who had not been long on the force, and 
who was in capital health and spirits, having lately been de- 
tailed, for his quickness, to special duty from the patrol to the 
Old Jewry. 

" Mr. Ralfe, you are good on Smithfield Market. Take this 
gentleman there at 4 o'clock to-morrow morning. Meet him 
at the Smithfield Police Station at 4 o'clock in the morning, 
and time your inspection so that you will be able to catch Fun- 
nell at the Fish Hill Monument at 5 o'clock in the morning, 
so as to have him see the fish come in at Billingsgate. And 
now. Sergeant Scott, you will show this gentleman the Mino- 
ries. Petticoat Lane, Bevis Marks, Houndsditch, and the Jews' 
Quarters, but those you will have to take on another day, as 
you have already a hard day's work before you. You had bet- 
ter see the market on Sunday morning, one of the greatest 
sights in the world, sir, I assure you, and the Rag Fair is also 
a grand show of the kind, I also assure you ; and now. Ser- 
geant Webb, I will give our friend in your charge when he has 
got through with the rest of them, and you and he can work 
the City, I think. You will do the Bank and the Mansion 
House and Newgate ; and, let me see, — Funnell can take him to 
the Sessions and the Old Bailey Courts ; and he will have to 
go to Scotland-yard to do the Borough of Westminster, as that 
is not in our jurisdiction. And now. Sir, good morning, and 
don't carry a watcli with you in the places where you are going, 



326 THE LONDON POLICE AND DETECTIVES. 

for some of the people are not very moral or very pious to get a 
look at. Good morning, Sir. Smithfield at 4 o'clock, Ralfe." 

Sergeant Webb was a tall, well-built man, in the prime of 
life, with ruddy checks, and a look that resembled the expres- 
sion usually worn by Mr. Seward before he lost all chances for 
the presidency. His face was smoothly shaved, and he looked 
as if he could assist with great dignity at a banquet. 

Sergeant Scott was a man just above the middle height, with 
light brown whiskers, and an easy, good-natured manner, who 
had a memory well stored with anecdotes of "blokes," and 
"wires," and "dummies." He had, also, choice stories of 
distinguished people who had, during their lives, been known 
in the " faking" line, and could have pointed me out a number 
of pals who were celebrated in the " kinchin lay " for snatching 
"wipes" and " grabbing tanners " and "browns" from little 
children when they were sent to the shops for bread or milk. 

At the back of the apartment in which the detectives were 
assembled to receive orders, stood a short, thick-set looking 
young man, with an amber moustache and goatee. His eyes 
were blue and his complexion very fair. He was dressed in a 
quiet manner, and nodded to each of the detectives as they 
passed out into the court of the Old Jewry. This was Jim Irv- 
ing, tlie celebrated American detective, who had apprehended 
Clement Harwood, the great forger, just as he was about to land 
in New York, and he was now waiting the trial of the accused 
which was to take place at the Mansion House. 

"Jim" was already quite familiar with the City of London, 
although he had been in it but a few days. He was, of course, 
rather astonished at the quiet, old-fashioned way, that the Eng- 
lish detectives had with them of waiting for a thief until he 
came and gave himself up. But he was very much charmed 
with a gorgeous seal-skin vest, for which he gave five guineas. 

Seventy-five years ago, London had not more than sixty-eight 
policemen or constables, and the present admirable system of 
Police is all owing to the clear head and sagacious mind of Sir 
Robert Peel, who first organized it about thirty-five years 
ago. The old local watch of the city consisted of the Bow 



POLICE DIVISIONS. 327 

street force of sixty-eiglit men, and the parish beadles, consta- 
bles, headboroughs, street keepers, and watchmen, in the sev- 
eral wards of the City, and in many cases these so-called officers 
of the peace were rascals of the worst description, in league 
with thieves and prostitutes. 

It is said that a Mr. George Vincent Dowling, (who was edi- 
tor of " Bell's Life " at the time,) gave Sir Robert Peel the first 
idea of the present organization, which consists of a Board 
of three Police Commissioners, a chief Superintendent, 25 Sub- 
Superintendents, 136 Inspectors, 700 sergeants, and over 7,000 
policemen. 4,000 men are on duty in the day-time and 3,000 
in the night time. During the day they are never allowed to 
cease patrolling, being forbidden even to sit down. They wear 
dark-blue pilot woven short frock coats, buttoned up to the neck, 
ti'ousers of the same material, with brass buttons on tlie coat 
and a pasteboard helmet covered with black rough felt. ^ 

The Police Districts are mapped out into divisions, the di\'is- 
ions into sub-divisions, the sulvdivisions into sections, and the 
sections into beats, all being numbered and carefully defined. 
To every beat, certain policemen are detailed, specifically, and 
they are pro\'ided with little slips of pasteboard, on which are 
printed the routes they are to take. So thoroughly has this 
management been perfected, that every street, lane, road, alley, 
and court, within the Metropolitan District — that is, the whole 
of the metropolis — (excepting that part in a radius of three- 
quarters of a mile from St. Paul's, which is called the City of 
London Proper) — including the County of Middlesex, and all 
the parishes, 220 in number, in the Counties of Surrey, Kent, 
Essex, and Hertfordshire, which are not more than 15 miles 
from Charing Cross in any direction, comprising an area of about 
700 square miles, and 90 miles in circumference, and with a po{> 
ulation of 3,500,000, — is visited constantly, day and night, by 
some of the police. Within a circle of six miles from St. Paul's, 
the beats are traversed in periods of time varying from twenty 
to fifty minutes, and there are some points, sucli as the Bank, 
the Mint, the Cathedral of St. Paul, the Abbey of Westminster, 
the Houses of Parliament, Buckingham Palace, the Horse 



328 THE LONDON POLICE AND DETECTIVES. 

Guards, and the Inns of Court, which are never free from in- 
spection for a single moment. 

Tliere arc 130 police stations in the metropolis, and hy a 
telegraph signal a Police Commissioner at Wliite Hall, in Par- 
liament street, which is contiguous to Scotland Yard, — the head- 
quarters of the Metropolitan Detective force, who are sepa- 
rated in their duties from the Old Jewry or City of London De- 
tective force, — can concentrate in an hour and a half as many 
as 6,000 men for instant duty. This vast force, each man re- 
ceiving but three shillings to three and sixpence a day, is really 
under a wonderful control. Each officer has to walk twenty 
miles a day in his rounds beside attending the police courts, 
which is equal to five miles in addition. 98,000 persons were 
arrested in one year — 1869, of which number 40,000 were dis- 
charged. The cost of the Metropolitan Police for one year was 
about £525,000, and the City Police, for the same term, <£60,- 
000 — the City Police numbering 700, the Metropolitan force 
nearly 7,000. 

The expenses of the Police Courts, for 1869, was £88,240, 
including the salary of one Magistrate at £1,500 a year, and 
thirty other Magistrates at £1,200 a year, each. Sixty pounds and 
six sliillings were expended for rattles, swords, and clubs, in the 
same time. The City Corporation are allowed, by act of Parlia- 
ment, to have their own Police and Commissioners in the licart 
of the metropolis, or City proper. There is, besides, a " Horse 
Patrol " for public occasions ; eight hundred of which were on 
duty on the day of the Oxford and Harvard race ; a "Thames 
River" Police, the ' Westminster Constabulary," and a "Police 
Office Agency," for recovery of stolen goods. Before the estab- 
lishment of the Thames Police, in 1797, the annual loss by rob- 
beries alone on the river, was £750,000 a year, the depreda- 
tors having various, curious names, such as " River Pirates," 
" Light" and " Heavy Horsemen," "Mud-larks," "Capemeu," 
and " Scuffle-hunters." 

They were frequently known to weigh a ship's anchor, hoist 
it with the cable into a boat, and when discovered, to hail the 
captain, tell him of his loss, and row. away cheerily. They also 



RIVER THIEVES. 



329 



would cut shipping and lighters adrift, run them ashore and 
then clean them out. Many of the "Light Horsemen" cleared 
as much as thirty pounds a night, and an apprentice to a 
"mock-waterman" often kept his saddle horse and covmtry seat. 
During the first year of the Thames Police, the saving to the 
West India merchants alone amounted to £150,000, and 2,200 
river thieves were convicted during that time, of misdemeanor. 
In those days, the magnificent docks which are now the chief 
ornament of London, had not been built with their high walls 
to keep out the swarming thieves who hamited the sliipping. 









CHAPTER XXI. 

HUNTING THE SEWERS. 

IDDEN in the bosoms of the sewers of 
every Great City lies a ■world of romance. 
The secrets of thousands of human beings, 
with their hopes and aspirations, their de- 
feats and disappointments, are garnered, 
in the relics of myriad households, whose 
rubbish is shot through drains, to be im- 
bedded in the accumulated masses at the bottom of the soggy 
sewerage. 

London has two thousand miles of bricked sewers, and the 
entire metropolis is honey-combed by tliese effluvious passages. 
These sewers are, of course, choked with refuse and swarm- 
ing with rats and other pestiferous vermin, by night and day, 
and are pervaded with noxious gases, which, when inhaled, 
cause almost instantaneous death. The rats grow as big as 
kittens in the sewers, and will face strong, healthy men, and 
give them combat — in legions. The rats feed on offal from the 
butchel's' slaughter houses, which is poured into the sewers, and 
they also subsist on the grain which comes from the breweries, 
in different parts of the city. 

Twenty years ago, the main sewers of London, having their 
outlets on the river side, were completely open, and it was 
lawful to enter them to search for valuables, but since then so 
many people have died of the gases, or have lost themselves m 
their noxious recesses, that a law was at last passed, by which 
persons entering the sewers to explore them, unless tliey were 
employed as workmen, became amenable to imprisonment, and 
at present the law is strictly enforced. 



SEWER HUNTERS. 331 

Formerly, when the spring tides in the Thames began, it was 
of common occurrence for the waters to dash into the sewers, 
sweeping everything in their way, and very often engulfing 
the workmen, or others engaged illegally in searching the sew- 
ers ; and days after one of these tidal floods had occurred bodies 
of drowned and disfigured men would be A-omited from the 
mouths of the sewers. 

Now, however, this is changed, and hanging iron doors, with 
hinges, are affixed to the mouths of the sewers, and arc so ar- 
ranged that when the tides are low the iron doors are forced 
open by the rubbish and wet refuse which is emptied into the 
Thames, and wlicn the tides rise the volume of water forces 
the doors back, and the river cannot enter the sewers. 
jk There are two or three hundred men in London, who earn 
a living by working in the sewers. These men, though there 
is a law against the practice, search the sewers, niglit and day, 
for old iron, rope, metal, money, or Avhatever is of value to the 
finder. They are called "Toshers," or "Shore-men," and are, 
in some things, very like the "mud-larks," who frequent the 
river sides. 

Some of these men are very fortunate at times, and succeed 
in obtaining good prizes from the black, stinking mud of the 
sewers. Gold Avatchcs, silver milk-jugs, breast-pins, bracelets, 
and gold rings, are obtained by them. These sewer hunters, 
liowever, do not trouble themselves to collect coal, wood, or cliips, 
j as is the case with the mud-larks. There are liettcr prizes for 
I them, and accordingly, they do not waste their time on such 

trifles. 
j The Sewer-Hunter, before penetrating a sewer, jirovides him- 
j self with a pair of canvas trousers, very thick and coarse, and 
a pair of old shoes, or high-top]X!d boots — the higlier the legs 
I the better. The coat may be of any material, only it must be 
j of heavy fabric, and there are large pockets in the sides, where 
I articles may be crammed at will. 

They carry a bag on their backs, these sewer-hunters, and in 
their hand a pole, seven or eight feet long, on one end of which 
is fastened a large iron hoe to rake up rubbish. 
21 



332 HUNTING THE SEWERS. 

Whenever they think the ground is unsafe, or treacherous, 
they test it with the rake, and steady their steps with the staff. 

Should a Sewer-Hunter find himself sinking in a quag-mire, 
he immediately throws out the long pole, armed with the hoe, 
and seizes the first object in the sewer, to hold himself up. In 
some places, had the searcher no pole, he would sink, and the 
more he tried to extricate his person, the deeper he would 
imbed his body. 

Use is made of the pole to rake the mud for iron, copper, or 
bones, and occasionally the rake turns up the remains of a human 
being, who may have perished in those fetid cells. Great skill 
is necessary in the hunter, to know always when the tide leaves 
and comes, so as to enable him to find articles at certain points. 

The brick work in many paiis is rotten, especially in old 
sewers, and there is great risk in traversing the channels, as 
sometimes, when the sewers are being flooded from the dams 
erected at stated intervals, the passage is flooded to a height of 
three feet, very suddenly, and if the Sewer-Hunter be not notified 
the first intimation of his danger is given by a thundering, 
rushing sound, and before he can escape the waters are upon 
him, and he is enveloped by them or hurled down with tre- 
mendous force, and swept along for miles in darkness, and 
filth, and despair, cut off from all human aid, no ear to hear 
his shouts, and no hand stretched forth to save. 

In some places where the arches are unsafe, he will not 
dare to touch any part of the roof of the sewers, or the sides, 
fearing that he may be buried beneath the ruins. The main 
sewers are generally five feet high from floor to ceiling, but the 
branch sewers are much lower, and it is necessary to crawl on 
hands and knees to proceed. In the main sewers, there arc 
niches built in the brick walls of some depth, with a raised 
platform, and the hunters always step into one of those when 
the sewers are being flooded, to clean them. 

Rats, unless in great numbers, will not attack a man if he 
passes them quietly, but if driven to a corner they will fly at 
the intruder's face and legs in hundreds. A bite from one of 
these rats will swell a man's face or arms to an enormous 



AN UNLAWFUL BUSINESS. 333 

size. The men who arc employed as "flusliers" to clean the 
sewers wear leather boots, the legs of which come up to the 
liips, and of thick leather, and when the rats make an attack 
on these men, they always flash their lanterns, which arc fast- 
ened to leather belts around their waists, and this frightens 
the vermin away, as they are not accustomed to light, and will 
flee from it if not molested. The big leather boots of the 
'' flushcrs" cannot be bitten through by the rats. 

The trenches or water-tanks for the cleansing of the sewers, 
are chiefly on the south side of the Thames, and as a proof of 
the great danger incurred by sewer-hunters from these floods 
of water suddenly let in on them, I am told that when a ladder 
was put down a sewer from the street some years ago, on 
which a hod-carrier was descending with a hod of brick, the 
rush of water from the sluice struck the ladder, and instantly, 
ladder, hod-carrier, and all, were swept away, and afterward 
the poor man was found at the mouth of the sewer, all bat- 
tered, torn, bruised, and dead. 

Whenever a Sewer-Hunter passes through a sewer under a 
street grating, he is compelled to close his lantern, e]se the 
reflection of the light through the grating would call the at> 
tention ol the police, and he would be taken before a mag- 
istrate. Doga are never taken through the sewers, for tlic 
same reason, as their barking would be noticed, although they 
would be an excellent defense against the rats. 

Occasionally skeletons of unfortunate cats have been found 
in the sewers, their bones completely cleared of flesh, and notli- 
ing but a little fur remaining. I should pity tlie cat that strayed 
into a sewer, as they do occasionally from house-drains and 
cesspools. 

As the Sewer-Hunters go along in the sewers, they often pick 
money from between the crevices of the brick-work, and now 
and then a handful of sovereigns have been taken from tlicse 
crevices. Sometimes a small i)ick is needed to recover metals 
or money from the crevices where they are wedged. 

One man told me that he found a small leather bag with 
two hundred sovereigns and some shillings in it, that had no 



384 HUNTING THE SEWERS. 

doubt l)ocn washed out from a drain. He said that he had often 
found money, and that he was well satisfied with his luck in 




THE SEWER-HUNTER. 



general. He had been for twenty years searching the sewers, 
and had amassed considerable property. He told me his 
story as follows : 



A RAT STORY. 335 

" The first niglit, yc know, that I went into a sower, I had a 
pal witli me, as is dead now. Steve Williams was his name — 
God rest his soul. I felt afccred wlien I went in and got lost 
two or three times, but Steve allers found me agin by hollering 
at me. I got the greatest flight that niglit I ever got in my 
life. We were somewhere in a scAver in old Smithfield, and 
there must have been a distillery somewhere there, for when I 
turned out of the main sewer into a l)ranch one, I saw by the 
liglit of the lantern a thiciv steam beyond me. I was a little 
ajiptkl of Steve, who had just got a haul of two silver ta])le- 
knives and a wateh chain of goold, and he was looking at tlie 
liaul he made when I saw the steam a fillin of tlie sewer. I 
weftt lJ.ong, when I got near it my head begun to get dizzy, 
and I fell back on my shoulders into the sewer. I got 
drunk in tlie steam from tlie distillery, — that's what ailed 
me — and it was so sudden like, that I would have lost my life 
if Steve hadn't been there. 

" Well, Steve saved my life agin the same night. We vrere 
pretty near the mouth of the sewer on the Thames, near 
Wa})ping, where we had a boat to take us off, for in those times 
the peelers never meddled with us like they does now. 

" Well, there was one place very ticklisli in the sewer, tliat 
Steve had cautioned me about, and this place was all broken 
and in holes, and it was chuck full of rats. When we came by 
^^ was foolish enough to turn the liglit of my lantern on tlie 
oroken place in the sewer, and sure enough, there was a reglar 
colony o' rats in a room — keeping house, — about two tliousand 
of them — with a hall-way and a room gnawed out of the bricks, 
as large as the room I live in at home. There they were, all 
stuck t^ogether, with their eyes a glariii at me Ifke Avinkin, and 
they all in a heap as big as a horse and cart. I never seed 
such a sight in my life. Steve told me to come on, and I was 
going, for the rats never said a word all tlie time, but looked 
at me and squealed — but just as I was turning around after 
Steve my foot slipped and I fell, and the lantern dropjicd into 
a pool and went out. 

" I must have frightened the rats, for there was an awful 



336 HUNTING THE SEWERS. 

squealing and scampering — ^but they didn't all run away, for I 
found a hundred of them fastened on my hands, legs, face, and 
body, when I fell. You may be sure I hollowed and yelled, for 
I wasn't used to these vermin then, and the more I hollowed 
and beat them, the more they squealed and bit me. 

" In a few minutes Steve came running back with his lantern, 
and seeing I was down and couldn't get up, he drove at them 
with his pole and killed half a dozen of them, and then they 
left me and jumped at him. Then we went at it for a couple 
of minutes, battling for our lives, and when we did beat them 
off we were bitten all over our bodies. I am sure if it warnt 
for Steve and his lantern that time, I should have been eaten 
up by the rats. You see, Sir, they thought when I stumbled 
and fell that I attacked them, for I found out since that they 
never begin first if they can help it." 





CHAPTER XXII. 

BACCHUS AND BEER. . 

T is an undeniable fact, that the Eng- 
lish are the greatest beer-drinking 
people in the world. The assertion 
may be disputed in favor of the Ger- 
mans (and their beverage, lager bier,) 
but who can compare the thin resin- 
ous beer of Munich and Vienna with 
the heavy bodied, soporific, and sinewy London pale ale, Edin- 
burgh ale, or Guiness Brown Stout, that has ever drank the 
latter malt liquors. 

To believe in his native beer is a necessary part of the Eng- 
lishman's religion, and it is with the proverbial Briton a trite 
saying, when an exile at Chicago, New 0]'lcans, New York, 
Madrid, Constantinople, St. Petersburg, or Calcutta, 

" You cawnt get a glass of hale in this blessed country — you 
knaw. You hawvent got the 'ops you knaw, and ye cawnt 
make it ye knaw." 

English literature and English }X)etry are full of beer and re- 
dolent of malt and hops, from Chaucer and Shakespeare down 
to the present day. Tom Jones, Roderick Random, the Spec- 
tator, the Tatler, the Guardian, Fielding, Hume, Smollett, Pope, 
Addison, Dryden, Goldsmith, and Samuel Johnson, never let 
slip a chance to prove the virtues and efficacy of beer, and 
'Alf and 'Alf. 

It was in a room in Barclay & Perkins' brewery in Soutli- 
wark, then owned by Mr. Thrale, that Samuel Johnson, (who, 



338 BACCHUS AND DEER, 

if lie was an obstinate, dogged, and overbearing old rascal, — yet 
was the father of modern Englisli,) wrote the famous Englisli 
Dictionary, and when Mr. Thralc died, Johnson being one of 
his executors, tlic property was sold to the Barclay & Perkins 
of that day for the sum of .£135,000. The present brewery 
encloses fifteen acres of buildings and vats, and is the largest 
in the world but one. 

The triljes that came from India and settled in Germany, 
to which Tacitus refers, were the first to introduce beer into 
Europe. The descendants of these long haired, fair skinned 
tribes, were long after, (in tlic sixteenth century,) tlie first to 
teach the English brewers the use of hops, for the people of 
England, of that day, made their beer after the manner of 
the ancient Egyptians, by the admixture of herbs, broom, and 
berries of the bay and ivy. 

In lo85, there were twenty -six brewers in London and 
Westminster, who brewed in tliat year 648,960 barrels of beer, 
and, six years after, they exported 24,000 barrels of beer to 
the Low Countries and Dieppe. In 1643, the first excise duty 
was imposed on beer. In 1722, tlie brewers stored their beer 
to keep it mellow, for the first time, and sold it to all liouse- 
kecpers to be retailed at three-] icnce a pot — holding over a 
pint. In 1869, 500,000 barrels of beer, valued at c£ 1,800,000, 
were exported from London to foreign places, being one-fourth 
of the total amount that was exported during the same time 
from other ports in England. 

British India took 201,000 barrels, Australia and N.ew Zea- 
land, 148,000 barrels, China, 35,000 barrels. Cape of Good 
Hope, 15,000, British West Indies, 30,000 barrels, Spain took 
209 barrels, Brazil, 15,000 barrels, Russia, 6^000, and France 
7,000 barrels. 

Barclay and Perkins employ a capital of £2,000,000 annu- 
ally in their trade, and 300 huge horses, brought from Flanders, 
at a cost of from =£60 to £100 each. These horses consume 
9,000 quarter hundreds of oats, beans, or other grain, 900 tons 
of clover, and 290 tons of straw for litter. The manure hops 
tjiat are spent, and other refuse, are taken by a Railway Company. 



CATS OX GUARD. 



339 



There are five partners in the house ; the firm behig worth 
£8,000,000, and the head brewer receives a salary of X 2,000 
a year. 

The water used for brewing purposes is that of tlic Thames, 
pumped by a steam engine, on the same ground where Shakes- 
peare's Globe Theatre stood three Imndred years ago. One hund- 
red and fifty thousand gallons of beer can be brewed from this 
water, daily. There are two engines of 100 liorse power each, 
which are nearly a Imndred years old. The furnace shaft is 19 
feet below the surface and 110 above it. The malt is carried 
from barges at the river-side, by porters, and deposited in enor 
mous bins, each of the height and depth of a three-story house. 
Rats are fond of malt, but to keep them off a staff of sixty large 




CATS RECEIVING RATIONS. 



cats are constantly employed on the premises, and all these cats 
are imder the su|3ervisi()n of a big-headed or chief cat, with a 
long moustache and Angola blood. 

It is quite a sight to witness the anxious solicitude of this 



340 BACCHUS AND BEER. 

Chief Cat for the honor of the liouse of Barclay & Perkins, and 
for the discipline of his subordinate cats, the chief being a 
Thomas of the purest breed. 

Thirty-six tons of coal per day arc used here for brewing pur- 
poses, and the malt is stored in a huge room, with liglit win- 
dows, called the Great Brewhouse, built entirely of iron and 
brick. There is no continuous floor, but looking upwards, 
whenever the steaming vapor rises, tlicrc may be seen, at 
various heights, stages, platforms, and flights of stairs, all oc- 
cupied by the Cyclopean piles of brewing vessels. 

There are also huge buildings next to the brewhouse, with 
cooling floors, into which is pumped the " hot Wort," as it is 
called, or beer. The surface of the floor in one of these build- 
ings is 10,000 feet square, and I saw men witli gigantic wooden 
shoes swimming about in this beer, which looked like a vast 
lake. The beer is sometimes cooled by passing it tlirough a 
refrigerator which has contact witli a stream of cold spring 
water. The cold beer is then allowed to ferment in vast rooms 
or squares, as large as an ordinary block of houses, — wliicli are 
made to hold 2,000 barrels. It is a strange sight to look at 
one of these lakes of beer, the yeast rising in masses like 
coral reefs in a southern sea, — upon the surface of tlie water, 
and these rock-like elevations yield, after the force of the yeast 
is spent, to the slightest wind, giving it the appearance of a 
vast ocean of beer in a storm. There is one Imge vat for jwrter 
that will hold 5,000 gallons, which at selling price is worth 
XI 2,000. Tlie Great Tun of Heidelberg holds but half of this 
quantity. One thousand quarter-hundreds of malt are brewed 
daily by Barclay & Perkins. 

The great rival house to that of Barclay & Perkins, is that 
of Hanbury, Buxton & Co., in Brick-Lane, Spitalficlds, covering 
eight acres ; in which 275,000 gallons of water are used daily, 
obtained from a well 530 feet deep ; — 600,000 barrels of beer 
are brewed here annually. There are 150 vats, tlie largest of 
which contains 3,000 barrels, or about 100,000 gallons of beer. 
There are eight brewing copi^crs, three of which are capable 
of containing 800 barrels each. 700 quarters of malt can be 



THE GREAT POUTER TUN. 



341 



mashed at one time in six mash tubs; — 10,000 tons of coal 
are used annually, and there are 200 Imge horses, each horse 
consuming 42 pounds of food per day, or about 2,500,000 
pounds per annum. 

There is a library with 5,000 volumes, a billiard-room, read- 
ing-room, and savings-bank, on the premises, with a benefit 
Club for the workmen, each member paying sixpence a week, 
and receiving fourteen shillings a week in case of sickness ; and 
on the death of his 



wife, <£8, and in the 
event of his own 
death the family re- 
ceives £18. Two 
companies of volun- 
teers were raised 
from the 800 em- 
ployees of the firm, 
and the men are 
allowed one holiday 
in a fortnight. 

The l)rcwery of 
Mr. Salt, at Burton- 
on-Trcnt, has been 
established for eigh- 
ty years, and brews 
annually 25,000 bar- 
rels of that peculiarly strong and bitter ale. 

In London it is calculated that about 6,500,000 barrels of 
ale, beer, and porter, are brewed annually, valued at about 
£20,000,000, and I think I am therefore correct in calling the 
English a beer-drinking people. 

Everybody drinks beer in London. You can sec laborere 
and dockmen sitting on benches outside of puljlic houses, 
swilling what they call swipes, at two pence a pot. So if you 
drink at a Club you will see men as eminent as Mr. Bright, or 
Mr. Disraeli, calling for a " pint of Bass' East Lidia Ale," or 
" a bottle of Stout." Even in workhouses beer is kept on tap, 




TUE GKEAT I'ORTER TUN. 



342 BACCHUS AND BEER, 

and were the paupers to 1)C deprived of their beer, they would, 
I believe, rise and annihilate their masters. A quart Itottle of 
good beer or porter can be got anywhere in London for six- 
pence, and of all the beverages that I have ever tasted, I never 
foiuid anything to equal in fragrance a drink of good Lon- 
don " Brown Stout " on a warm summer day. A man may 
})rocurc as much good V)ccr as lie can drink at a drauglit, for 
three pence, in London, at any public house or restaui-ant, and 
it is the common custom with tlie Cockneys to have it at every 
meal, and also between meals. 

Tlicy have also a fashion in large parties among (he work- 
ing and middle classes, of ordering what is called a '" Queen 
Ann," which is simply three pints of beer in a large, i)rightly 
burnished metal pot with a handle, and the man who calls 
for it having paid, takes a drink, then wipes the edge of the pot 
with the cuff of his coat-sleeve, to remove the foam from liis lips, 
— then passes it to his wife, sweetheart or his eldest child, who 
each in turn drink and wipe the edge of the measure ; then it 
is passed to the stranger, and all around the board, each person 
being careful to wipe the " peA\i:cr" in the same fashion, 'i his 
custom seems rather strange and savage at llie first siglit to an 
American, but it is the custom of the country, and therefore 
cannot be quarreled with. 

Benjamin Franklin, as we learn by his diary, was disgusted 
by the beer-swilling Londoners. When a journeyman printer 
in London before 1776, he says — " I drank only water ; tlic 
other workmen, near fifty in number, were drinkers of beer. 
We had an alehouse boy who attended always in the house to 
supply workmen. My companion at the press drank every 
day, a pint before breakfast, a pint at breakfast with his bread 
and cheese, a pint between ])reakfast and dinner, a ])int at din- 
ner, a pint in the afternoon al)out six o'clock, and another pint 
when he had done his work. I thought it a detestable custom, 
but it was necessary, he sn])posed, to drink stro7u/hccr, that he 
might be s^ro/ig- himself. ITc had four or five shillings to ])ay 
out of his wages every week for the detestable liquor." 

Tliis is pretty strong testimony from Franklin, and 1 find 



QUANTITY DRANK IN LONDON. 343 

tliat although lie frequented alehouses in London, where all 
the men of wit and learning of the time were to be found, yet 
he never indulged in beer. 

Any foreigner passing through a London street which is in- 
liabitcd by working men and their families, or in the neighbor- 
liood of factories or other industrial establishments, if the period 
of the day be between twelve and one o'clock, or just after 
twelve, cannot fail to notice a sudden commotion and rush of 
men, women, and half naked children, with jugs, pewter 
measures, tin cans, and earthen vessels, to the ncigliboring 
ta}>room or beer-liouse. All this large multitude are in quest 
of beer for the noonday meal. 

At noon and night the pot boys of the imnnnerable becr- 
sliojjs may be seen carrying out the quarts and pints daily re- 
ceived by those families who do not choose to lay in a stock or 
store of their owji beer, or the mothers and cliildren of the 
same families, to whom the lialf-pcnny given to the pot l)oy is 
a matter of consequence, may be seen journeying to tlie beer- 
conduits themselves, and the drinking goes on from morning 
initil night, among truckmen, coal heavers, street jiavers, me- 
chanics in the " skittle grounds," medical students in the 
hospitals, law students in the Inns of Court, and " swells " in 
taverns. 

From the gray of the morning until the hour of dark, you 
may see in the London streets those large drays, larger horses, 
huge draymen, and large casks of beer, ever present and never 
absent from the Londoner's eyes. Go down to the Strand, that 
street which borders the river, and you will see tlie same drays 
and Flemish horses emerging from the huge brewery gates, 
preparatory to carrying barrels of beer to tap-houses, and nine- 
gallon casks, the weekly allowance of a private London family, 
to dwelling-houses. 

A eomi)etent authority has estimated that each and every 
inhabitant of London will drink, averaging young and old — 
80 gallons of beer in the year. The population is 3,500,000. 

Therefore, Great is Beer, and Barclay and Perkins are its 
prophets. 



CHAPTER XXIII. ' 



HARVARD AGAINST OXFORD. 




ELDOM — perhaps not twice in a hundred 
years, had such a night of excitement been 
known in London as that which ushered in 
the morning of the Twenty - Seventh of 
August, 1869, the ever-memorable day on 
which a million of half-crazy people were to 
witness the Great University Boat Race between Oxford and 
Harvard. This race, it was universally declared, would for- 
ever settle the mooted question of British pluck and American 
endurance, by twenty-five minutes hard pulling in two four- 
oared boats on the River Thames, between Putney and Mort- 
lake. 

The boasted phlegm of the English race had, as it were, dis- 
appeared before the touchstone of national rivalry, and prince, 
peer, peasant, and cabman alike felt that the honor of England 
was in the hands of Mr. Darbishire's Oxford crew. 

For weeks before the race came off, the London shopkeepers, 
mercers, haberdashers, and drapers, had illuminated windows 
and doorways with neckties, scarfs, shoe-buckles, ribbons, silks, 
and hosiery, and with the greatest commercial impartiality, 
these articles that I have named, with a hundred others that I 
cannot recollect, had been made to assume the modest hues of 
the Oxford Dark Blue, and the blazing brilliancy of the Har- 
vard Magenta. The merits of the men of l)oth Universities 
had undergone the severest mental and conversational scrutiny 
in every part of the metropolis. 



POLICE ARRANGEMENTS. 345 

In a great city with a population of over tlirce millions of 
Englishmen, it was but natural and just that Oxford should 
hold high ascendancy, and that Oxford favors should be worn 
almost exclusively, and that the superiority of Oxford rowing, 
should be with high and low a question of orthodoxy. Night 
settled down on the myriad roofs and church steeples of Lon- 
don, and ten young lads, down at the little village of Putney, 
with its narrow streets and old-fashioned church, braced them- 
selves, before going to sleep, for the greatest athletic conflict 
that the Ninteenth century has known. 

The sun broke over the London house-tops on that eventful 
Friday morning, the Twenty-Seventh of August, with unusual 
brilliancy for an English sun. The weather had not been of 
the most promising kind for some days previous, and it was 
feared that the day might turn out a foggy or a rainy nuisance, 
and thus interfere with the pleasure which so many countless 
thousands had promised tliemselves in witnessing the race. 
London was astir at an early hour, and great crowds filled the 
streets in the direction of the railroad stations on the Surrey 
side of the river, and in the vicinity of the numerous steam- 
boat wharves, for the purpose of securing an early transporta- 
tion to the scene of the conflict. 

At 9 o'clock the stations of the Northwestern, the Metro- 
politan, and the London and Northwestern Railways — at Wa- 
terloo, Vauxhall, Clapham Junction, Wadsworth, Putney, Lud- 
gate Hill, London and Blackfriars Bridges, Euston, Chalk Farm, 
Hammersmith, Paddington, and Westminster — were swarm- 
ing with masses of men, women, and children, vainly endeav- 
oring, struggling, pushing, and trying to obtain precedence of 
each other, in order to get tickets to be carried to the boat 
race. The different railway companies of London, in order to 
accommodate the tremendous number of spectators, had sus- 
pended their regular traffic and agreed to run excursion trains 
all day steadily until an hour before the race. 

The Thames Conservancy Board, which has the power to 
clear the river and prevent obstructions from delaying tlie race, 
had worked manfully, and by great exertions had succeeded in 



346 HARVARD AGAINST OXFORD. 

making every steamboat captain and owner on the river know* 
that he would be compelled by force to remain above Putney 
Bridge, where tlie race was to begin, on penalty of £20 fine ; 
and if rash enough to run the risk of fine, the police were to 
seize the offending steamer and quench her fires, and thus pre- 
vent further locomotion. 

One steamboat speculator had been selling tickets at two 
guineas a head for the steamer Venus, and had declared openly 
that he would pay the fine of <£20 and run the boat anyhow, 
desjute the authorities of the river and the police who swarmed, 
in hundreds of small boats and tiny steam launches, all over 
the broad surface of the Thames. 

When the steamer Venus came down to Putney Bridge, how- 
ever, she was stopped very quickly, and her cheated passengers 
were forced to remain on board and witness the start, but the 
steamer was fastened at anchor and could no farther go. Pas- 
sengers by this unlucky boat, who were unable to stand the 
broiling sun for four or five hours, debarked at Putney, and 
consoled themselves with mutton chops and bitter beer at the 
Star and Garter. Formerly, at the University races between 
Oxford and Cambridge, there was not only danger that the 
race itself would be interrupted, or perhaps lost, by the reck- 
less rushing to and fro of the innumerable steamers that were 
sure to follow the progress of the boats towards ]\Iortlake. but 
it was also very unsafe for passengers in small boats, wherries, 
or launches, to venture on the river, owing to the manner in 
which the steamers dashed to and fro at the bidding of the 
eager captains. 

But the assertions in some of the American newspapers, 
that the Harvard crew would meet with foul-play from some 
scoundrel or other who might employ money to influence a 
master of one of those vessels, liad aroused a determined en- 
ergy among the members of the Thames Conservancy Board, 
and the result was a clear river, in one sense, from Putney to 
Mortlakc, for the two crews. 

When I say in one sense, I mean that the channel of the 
river was kept clear of steamboats and skiffs alike ; but, while 



THOMAS HUGHES, M. P. 347 

the steamers we^e not allowed inside of the chains stretched 
across at Putney and Mortlake, thousands of every description 
of small craft lined the river for a space of five miles on both 
sides, on the Surrey and Middlesex shores, — but out of the 
path where the race-boats were to make the essay for supe- 
riority. 

But two steamboats were allowed to follow the crews, and one 
of these was the steamer Lotus, engaged to carry the referee, 
Mr. Thomas Hughes, M. P., author of "Tom Brown at Ox- 
ford," "School Days at Rugby," and other well-known and 
popular books — Besides the umpire for each crew, the judge of 
the race, Sir Aubrey Paul, and a number of ladies and gen- 
tlemen specially invited. Besides this boat there was also the 
steamboat Sunflower, chartered for the use of the press of Lon- 
don and for the benefit of American correspondents in London, 
by one of the editors of BelVs Life. These two boats were 
never more than fifty yards to the rear of the Oxford and Har- 
vard shells during the progress of the race. 

At half past 1 o'clock the press boat had been advertised to 
leave the Temple Pier for the scene of the race. Taking a 
cab at the head of Regent street, I had a good opportunity to 
oljserve the streets and shops and numerous vehicles. Of the 
six or seven thousand cabs which are to be found at the differ- 
ent stands all over London, hardly one this morning but is in 
some way decorated for the festival. These sharjvcyed, cun- 
ning-looking cabbies, in their careless attire, each with a brass 
medal depending from his breast, giving his number and license, 
have an eye to the main chance. Their long whips are tipped 
with short bows of blue ril)bon in the greater number, while a 
few have magenta ties. Out of respect for the Yankees, they 
will charge them to-day a shilling a head more than they dare 
ask from an Englishman. 

The great clumsy busses, that look more like advertising 
vans than vehicles for the purpose of carrying passengers, are 
splendid this day with decoration. They are made, as the sign 
above each tells you, to carry twelve inside and sixteen 
outside. The drivers of the busses have a more respectable 
22 



348 HARVARD AGAINST OXFORD. 

look and are more profound in their wit than the cabbies. They 
have a soHd British look that tells plainly of roast beef and 
careful usage. The cabbies are to the buss drivers a sort of 
gypsies, and are looked upon by them witli suspicion. Every 
omnibus is crowded with passengers tliis cheerful, sunny day. 

All London seems going to the race. Dry goods clerks, 
licensed victualers, " cads," grocers, public-house keepers, bar- 
boys, stable-boys, bar-maids, servant-maids, well-to-do trades- 
men and their wives and children, apothecaries' assistants, 
golden-haired milliners nicely gloved, dressmakers' apprenti- 
ces, pickpockets, peers of the United Kingdom, University 
men in cap and gown. Charter House boys with yellow stock- 
ings on their legs, and dark-blue frocks fastened at their waists 
with leather straps, wandering Americans displaying large 
diamonds and shocking bad hats, Westminster schoolboys on 
tlie foundation of Elizabeth, the Dean of St. Paul's in his 
shovel hat, city men, brokers and bankers, watermen from the 
Thames, professional oarsmen, Jew and Gentile ; — they are all 
interested and will all see the race or a part of it. 

I never saw anything like this great crowd before. It is 
believed that two hundred and fifty thousand people is tlie aver- 
age number that are in the habit of witnessing a Cambridge 
and Oxford boat-race, but Cambridge has been beaten so often 
that the interest does not compare at one of these races with 
the tumultuous, all-pervading feeling that is borne in every 
man's bosom as he hurries along to-day. It is not so very cer- 
tain that Harvard will be beaten, although it is rumored here 
and there tliat Loring, the stroke of the crew, is unwell, which 
rumor only tends to increase the odds on Oxford. 

The Temple Pier is reached at last. We pass through an 
arched gateway at tlie bottom of a narrow street opening on 
the Thames. This spot is more historic even than Westminster 
Abbey. There Ijefore us is the Church of the Temple, seven 
hundred years old and black with time. All tlie ground around 
us belonged, in the old bygone days, to the Knights of the 
Order of the Temple. Now the place is the resort of attorneys 
and barristers, and in it legal people have chambers. Right 



DARK BLUE AND MAGENTA. 349 

in the shadows of the old Norman towers and battlements of 
the ancient church, Jack Cade's followers rose from a swinish, 
drunken sleep to turn their weapons against each other, hund- 
reds falling in the conflict. 

Here in these chambers resided Chaucer, Gower, Spenser, 
Clarendon, Coke, Plowden, Selden, Beaumont, Congreve, Wych- 
erley, Edmund Burke, Cowper, Samuel Johnson, Oliver Gold- 
smith, Pope, Eldon, Erskine, and others equally famous. Here 
tliey slept, joked, read, ate, and drank. Surely, if this ground 
be not hallowed, none other is. In company with a well-known 
American journalist, Mr. George Wilkes, I find my way to the 
Press "boat, which is lying at the foot of the Temple Pier, off 
the Embankment. She is a long, double-ender, with a red 
streak on the upper part of her keel, and a black hull. Her 
steam funnel is made to be lowered at the base, worlcing on 
hinges, when going under a bridge. Like all Tliamcs boats 
to-day, there are two flags hoisted on her twin flag-staffs — the 
American and English. There is no awning, no upper-deck, 
to shade us from the August sun, whicli is now beginning to 
burn with ati intensity peculiarly un-English. 

There are, perhaps, about fifty persons on the boat, of whom 
two-thirds are English ; the remainder Americans. They are 
not all newspaper men, though it was understood, before the 
tickets were sold, that none but newspaper men would be al- 
lowed on board. 

The Englishmen wear blue scarfs and bows ; the Americans 
sport the magenta all over their clothes. The sun falls on tlie 
broad, muddy river in slanting beams of kindling gold, making 
the old warehouses on both banks of the stream, witli their 
yellow brick gables, to stand out in bold relief. 

Above us is London Bridge, lowering in its immensity, and 
to tlic right is Billingsgate Market and Paul's wliarf. Close 
upon our stern is Blackfriars Bridge, the Temple Gardens, 
Kings College — a massive, dirty gray stnicture, running along 
the river bank ; Somerset House, the government building 
where all the clerical work of the administration is done, and 
where well-fed and well-paid clerks enjoy sinecures of the kind 



350 HARVARD AGAINST OXFORD. 

which the Barnacle family were so fond of. Before us is 
Waterloo Bridge, Cecil, Duke, Salishury, Surrey, Bucking- 
ham, Villiers, and otlier streets called after the mansions once 
inhabited by the favorites of Charles, James, and William of 
Blessed Memory. 

At a little before two o'clock the Sunflower steams off on her 
journey up the river. The course of the steamer is impeded at 
almost every foot by small craft of all descriptions, en route to 
Putney and the race. 

We pass, on our way down, Waterloo Bridge, Charing Cross 
Bridge, with its huge railroad trains thundering over our heads, 
bound to Dover, with passengers for the Continent ; West- 
minster Bridge and the Houses of Parliament, with their gilt 
vanes, towers, and battlements glistening in the sun ; Lambeth 
Bridge and Lambeth Palace, the residence of the Primate of 
England, with its gardens and red brick towers ; St. Thomas 
Hospitals, in process of construction ; Millbank Penitentiary, 
a gloomy, six-sided fortress of crime ; Vauxhall Bridge ; Pim- 
lico Pier, where we stop a moment ; the Nine Elms Road, 
Chelsea Bridge, and Clijclsea Hospital, where a number of frisky, 
one-legged and one-armed veterans are disporting themselves 
on its smooth, grassy lawn ; the Botanic Garden on the right, 
and the green fields and trees and silvery lake of Battersea 
Park on the left ; Albert Bridge, Cadogan Pier, Chelsea Pier, 
Battersea Bridge, and the Cremorne Gardens, with its kiosks, 
captive balloon, statues, shady walks, fountains, and flower 
beds ; and now we are opposite Fulham and Brompton, where 
the splendid and extravagant Formosas of the metropolis en- 
joy their ill-gotten gains in pleasant villas and cozy little 
houses. 

We are now getting away from the thickly populated districts 
of London, and the bridges that cross the river are fewer and 
farther between, and, being generally of wood, are more 
rickety. 

During the entire passage we are continually stopped by 
small craft of all kinds. The river is alive with tliem. 

There are huge yawls, of broad bottom and clumsy construe- 



ON THE TOWING PATH." '351 

tion, containing family parties, with their provender — bread, 
cheese, and beer, ham pies, and beef pies, kidneys and tongues 
— spread out in the bottom of the boats on white cloths or in 
open baskets ; there arc long shells with crews of eight and 
four, carrying coxswains ; single sculls, double sculls, wherries, 
watermen's boats, small steam launches, lighters, watermen's 
barges, small sloops and schooners with dirty sails and un- 
seemly rudders, pleasure yachts, and craft of such queer shape 
and rig as are never seen on our American rivers. 

All are bent on pleasure, and in many of the boats they are 
singing the slang songs of the London streets; and now and 
then are warbled the cheering chants of the boatmen immor- 
talized by Dilxlin and Taylor, the water poets. A couple of 
miles more and we are in sight of Putney Bridge, which towers 
aloft, rickety, worn, and decayed, thousands crossing to and 
fro on its frail planks to get positions for the race. 

And now the full grandeur of a sight such as is seldom or 
ever seen bursts upon every one on board the Press boat, and 
even the Londoners admit, in an easy way, that the Derby Day 
is eclipsed by the great number of people who line the banks 
of the river for miles on the Surrey and Middlesex shores. 

To the left, above the old bridge, is the village of Putney, 
with its narrow streets and noisome lanes, its green fields, fes- 
tering pools, eccentric-looking mansions and houses of an hum- 
bler kind, the steeples of St. John's and St. JMary's, with their 
quaint clock-towers; and to the left, on the Middlesex bank, 
are Fulliam and the Bishop of London's palace, the long grass 
on the Bishoi)'s lawn waving in the breeze, and uj)on whose 
surface were stretched pic-nickers eating and drinking. 

The Star and Garter at Putney, a famous hostelry, where 
the crew of Harvard had lodged when they first came to Eng- 
land, was covered nil over its surface toward the river with 
the flags of America and England. The old wooden balconies 
were crowded with ladies wearing favors in their bosoms; the 
passages and lanes leading to the towing-path on the river 
swarmed with foot passengers, all having one determination 
and one sole object. The " Bell Inn," a rival to the Star and 



352 HARVARD AGAINST OXFORD, 

Garter, was also glorious with colors, and all the house-own- 
ers for miles along the river had let their windows and seats 
on their roofs for various sums, varying from five shillings 
to five guineas per head. 

One generous American "lady" had advertised in the Times 
that she would let seats in licr windows to her countrymen at 
the modest price of two guineas per head, and she found that 
she had not half room enough for her compatriots. An inn 
keeper on the towing-patli had let the front of his house for 
<£40 to a speculator, who realized a profit of £25 on the venture. 
The Leander Boat-house, belonging to a well-known boating 
club, had a scaffolding erected fronting the river for the mem- 
bers and their ladies, whicli was covered with Union Jack bunt- 
ing, the structure lacing the place where the Oxford crew had 
housed their race-boat. 

Close to it was the boat-house of the London Rowing Club, 
an association of four hundred gentlemen, who had proved them- 
selves warm and steady friends of tlie Harvard crew since their 
arrival here. The Harvard boat was housed here, and the 
staging and platform were decorated with American colors. A 
number of ladies, wearhig red rosettes, were seated upon this 
balcony. 

A few yards below was the modest stone house where the 
Harvard crew were sleeping two hours before the race. This 
place was enclosed by a stone wall, breast high, and shaded by 
green trees. Platforms were erected behind tliis wall, and on 
them I noticed seated the American Minister, Mr. Motley, the 
Hon. S. S. Cox, " Tom Hughes," Charles Reade, the novelist 
— a bluff-looking, hearty Englishman, in gray clothes — and a 
number of ladies, just before the race began. 

Back from this house ran the High street, and, I believe, the 
only street of Putney, and in this street was located the unpre- 
tending place of residence of the Oxford men. The towing- 
path on the Surrey side of the river runs along for miles away 
beyond Mortlake, and on the Middlesex bank there is also a 
path, and on both of these paths it is customary on a race day 
for thousands of harmless maniacs to run along, hats and coats 




TUE UAKVARD CREW. 



A FRIGHTFUL JAM. 355 

in hand, vainly endeavoring to keep up with race-boats going 
at a speed greater than a mile every five minutes. 

Of course, they soon lose sight of the boats after the start ; 
yet they will still run, hallooing, cheering, and shouting like 
madmen. To furnish sport and amusement for the myriads of 
Cockneys who come by rail, steamboat, or on foot, from Lon- 
don and its environs, there are not wanting sharpers, players, 
peddlers, fighting-men, showmen, venders of all kinds of fruit, 
vegetables, meats, pies, drinks, ices, and all kinds of knick- 
knacks — things useful and useless; and these i)eo})le and 
their wares combined make up a kind of a Bartholomew's fair 
on a grand scale. 

The fair and its accessories covered the towing-path for three 
miles, and rendered the passage most difficult on this occasion 
for the many pedestrians. Dresses were torn, buttons pulled 
off, hats smashed, bonnets rumpled, hoops irretrievably wrecked, 
children trod on, women half suffocated and rendered faint and 
sick; yet, back from the river, for fifty or sixty feet, for a dis- 
tance of three miles, the uproar and sale of questionable mer- 
chandise and doubtful provender never ceased for an instant. 

It was a scene such as is displayed once in a man's lifetime, 
to remain indelibly engraved on his mind ever after. One thou- 
sand policemen lined both banks of the river to keep order, but 
most of them were on the Surrey, or most thronged bank of tlie 
stream. A large number of those were mounted on huge black 
horses, and but for them many lives would have been lost on 
this most eventful day of days. 

At the boat-houses, where the shells of the rival crews were 
concealed from the gaze of the crowds, outside, the jam was 
frightful, and very dangerous, as the police every few moments 
had to back their horses into the crowd to keep a passage-way 
clear, and on several occasions were compelled to charge the 
dense masses of men, women, and children. 

Some time before the race came off, I made my way along 
the towing-path as well as I could through the swaying, surg- 
ing crowds, for the purpose of taking a look at the amusements 
they were enjoying. 



356 HARVARD AGAINST OXFORD. 

There was a large crowd around a man who stood before a 
circular table, the top of which revolved on a pivot. The sur- 
face was painted and divided into four triangles by colored lines. 
In each angle was painted the name of some famous horse, 
such as "Formosa," "Pretender," "Blue Gown," and "Lady 
Elizabeth." An indicator, lilcc the hand of an eight-day clock, 
swung on a i)ivot in the centre of the circle. 

A spectator being invited to place sixpence on the name of 
some favorite horse, the proprietor of the show gave the circu- 
lar board a spin, and if the indicator stopped opposite the name 
of the horse where he had placed his money, he gained a shil- 
ling. The fellow who had this machine in operation was a 
hard-looking case, in a greasy cutaway velvet coat. His ora- 
tory was to the point and business-like. 

"Down vith ycr sixpence; and make yer bets, gentlemen. 
My hindicator is sure as the clock of St. Paul's and twice as 
waluablc ha liacquisition. I don't care vether it is Formosy or 
Purtendir that ycr bets ycr bob lion. Yer take Hoxford or 
ye take 'Avard — 

Hi gives 'er a spin 
Han lets yev vin ; 

vich is poetry, and if ye dosn't vin, I gits the tin ; vich is po-e- 
try agin, and is halso a favrite hexpression of the Chanselur 
of the Hexcheckever ven he piles hon the blessed taxis has 'as 
made me sell hall my property to liavoid a bust hup. Try yer 
luck agin ; thank ye sir. Formosy, sir, sure to vin or lose." 

Close by this amusing bhackgniard is the stand of the root- 
beer, ginger -beer, and bitter-beer seller, who is crying out from 
behind his little cart : 

" Yalk hup and try this ere de-lee-shus bewerage, honly 
tuppence a bottle. If ye don't like it I gives ye yer money 
back, and no 'arm done. The Prinse of Vales alvays buys 'is 
beer hof me ven 'e isnt travelin, for the good of 'is 'ealth. Valk 
hup and don't be ashamed ; the no-bil-e-tee and gen-te-ree hall 
pati'onizes me. Ginger-beer, ginger-beer, and may the best 



BOOTHS AND SHOWS. 357 

man win, as my vife says, vcn she sees two pickpockets a fight- 
in' for a shilliu'." 

" Trick-liat-the-loop, ring the nail, and ye gets three h'apens. 
Ring tlie nail and ye gets three h'apens. And 'ow mnch does 
ye hiiivcst. Vy honly lia 'apenny. A man von two hundred 
pun hof me hast vcek, and tliere 'e his just now agoin to bet hit 
all on the Iloxford crew, and ef ye don't believe me just hax 
'im 'isself," said a seedy looking wretch, with a handful of 
small iron rings in his hand, directing his index finger to some 
indistinct personage in the crowd, whom no one present could 
recognize. 

The number of apple, pear, goosberry, plum, pie, and ice- 
cream stands that line the path are almost incalculable to think 
of Pics square, round, and triangular of shape, in all the 
varied stages of decay, are for sale at a penny a piece. Tarts, 
cheese cakes, mutton pot-pies, ham pies, suet puddings, whelks, 
a sort of odorous shell-fish, at half-penny apiece, green gages, 
and "sandviches" are shouted on every side of us. 

There are all kinds of games in progress. There is the 
ancient and honorable game of "cockshie," and "cocoa-nut." 
The latter is curious. Three cocoa-nuts, hollowed out, are 
placed on the top of as many sticks, which are stuck ui)right 
in the ground, and the game, costing a penny, is to knock off 
those cocoa-nuts at three strokes, when you can claim three 
pence — providing, of course, that you knock off all three cocoa- 
nuts ; whicli, of course, can only be done by the princely pro- 
prietor himself after hard training. 

There is one noisy fellow on a little hillock, pockmarked and 
ferret-eyed, in a greasy woolen duster, who has drawn a large 
crowd around him by liis i:)eculiar and quack-like oratory. This 
fellow is a gem, in his way, of purest ray serene. He is a 
merchant of penny scarf and finger rings. 

"Now," says lie, elevating a scarf ring on one finger and a 
wedding ring on another, in sight of the wondering crowd, 
"hif hi was to tell you good people that these hcuty-fool rings 
wor pure goold, vot vould you say ? Vy, you vould say, in the 



358 HARVAED AGAINST OXFORD. 

most hcxitibel and liunmistakabel langvidgc lias could come 
from your blessed traps, 'cc his a harraut liimposter. 

" Could hi blame yer for hcxpressing yer feelinks iu sicli 
langvidge ? No, Hi vould say to my disturbed conscience, 
has was at that very moment a tearing my hinsidcs to pieces, 
*you, Villiam Bowsley, have forsaken the good karraktir has 
was 'anded down to yer by hancestors who 'ad their hown hes- 
tates, 'osses, and kcrridges ; Villiam Bowsley, you 'ave been 
han harrant himpostor, and deserves to be 'ung.' Yell, does 
I tell ye that these ere rings is goold ? No ; on the contrcery, 
I says they are brass. Veil, may be ye don't care so much for 
brass harticles. Ham hi a friend of brass ? No, agin. But 
I ham a friend of Hart. I asks ye to look at this ere image 
of Mr. Gladsfwn, as is now hour blessed Fn-7)iee7'. Wos hevcr 
anything so beau-ty-fool ? Look at the insinivatin smile on 'is 
sveet feetyures. Ven I last dined vith Mr. Gludstun — ye 
needn't laff, cos ye knows, perhaps, the story in the Good Book 
of the bad children 'oo chaffed the old Profits and wus heat 
hup by bares — ven I last dined vith Gladstiin, hour blessed 
Trl-meer, he says, ' Bill ' — he calls me ' Bill ' ven 'ee his friendly 
— ' Bill, them pictures on them ere kam-e-o-s as you sells is my 
likeness just like twins. Cos, vy,' said he, 'my maiden haunt 
rcckignized them, and fainted avay ven she seed vun.' " 

Passing along a few feet I am attracted by tlie noise of a 
loud, rough voice, that is shouting over the thickly packed 
heads of another crowd : 

'' Step hup gentlemen and take a look hat the noble hart of 
Self-Defence has his practised in the Royal Tent, This vay 
gentlemen, honly tuppens. Brisket Bill and the 'Ackney Vick 
Cove is a goin' to set-too. Step hup." 

There is a large tent back from the path covered all over 
with representations of half-naked boxers in the act of defend- 
ing themselves, or mauling or beating each other to pieces, and 
the master pugilist stands on a high bench to attract the crowd, 
while at the same time he can look inside of the tent and direct 
the ceremonies by calling time and announcing the names of 
the combatants. Two wretclicd, miserable looking women, 



THE BOXING TENT, 359 

their features furrowed with want, their eyes bleared with gin, 
and their general appearance indicative of hard luck, cruel 
treatment and filth, hold each a sheet of the tent in their hands, 
and one of them pnts out her hand to take the two pence 
wliicli is the price of admission. 

I pass in to the tent and find twenty or thirty hard-looking 
cases circling around "Brisket Bill" and the "Hackney Wick 
Cove," who are stripped to their waists, their features inflamed 
with passion, their hair cropped short, and boxing gloves on 
their hands. There are half a dozen burly, big soldiers in the 
tent belonging to different arms of the Queen's service, and two 
of them wear the red shell jackets and army fatigue caps of the 
Life Guards. Brisket Bill is a low-sized, compact, thick witted 
brute in corduroys and heavy ho]>nailed shoes, who has been 
probably "starring" in the provinces, and the Hackney Cove is 
a tall, well-made, fresh-faced-looking young fellow, who is quite 
lively on his feet, and seems to rather like the punishment 
which Brisket gives him every now and then in the clicst and 
face. 

A ruffianly faced scoundrel offers me a ticket to go to his box- 
ing benefit on the next Monday night, which is declined, and at 
the next moment the Hackney Cove knocks Brisket Bill, with 
a tremendous blow, kicking at my feet, while cheers greet the 
feat from the Life Guards, roughs, thieves, and clodhoppers in 
the tent, and the Master Pugilist cries from the top of the tent 
outside : 

" Vind hup. Brisket ; 'it 'im 'ard and be done vith your lark- 
ing. Give these gentlemen the vorth of their tupcnce. Yind 
hup, I say, and stop 'im." 

Going down the towing path I found the crowd increasing 
every moment, and all streaming from the direction of London. 
A great number of soldiers were present all in bright uniform, 
Avithout side-arms, and all carrying jaunty canes — lancers, foot 
guards, riflemen, artillery drivers, men of the siege train, 
heavy cavalry, dragoons, and light-infantry men. The majority 
of these warriors bold were accompanied by their sweethearts, 
pretty, clear-skinned English girls in tlicir best bibs and tuckers, 



360 HARVARD AGAINST OXFORD. 

and of course they all wore the Oxford blue on their persons. 
Hundreds of small dirty-faced and ragged boys swarmed in 
and out of the numerous tents, and many grown men were en- 
deavoring by bawling loudly, to dispose of badges and rosettes. 
Some of them had pieces of wide dark blue ribbon with the 
words cribbed from the famous ballad of Tommy Dodd a little 
altered, inscribed in gilt type on them : 

"Now boys, let's all go in ; 
Oxford — Oxford sure to win, 

Tommy Dodd." 

Others sold small rosettes with the words "Oxford Laurels" 
engraved, and Harvard badges made of red, white, and blue 
lutestring, bearing the arms of the United States, the eagle ram- 
pant, and screaming fiercely, while one costermonger's cart 
had elevated on canvas in bold letters, the words of Nelson at 
Trafalgar, forever classic in the English tongue : 

"ENGLAND EXPECTS THIS DAY THAT EVERY MAN SHALL 
DO HIS DUTY." 

Almost every person who passed this costermonger cart 
cheered or approved of the legend in some way ,while as a counter 
irritant a party of Americans who had hired a whole house, had 
the Star Spangled Banner displayed with the following couplet 
underneath, in glaring type, and which attracted very consid- 
erable attention : 

"Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just, 
And this be our motto : In God be our trust !" 

I saw numbers of Americans, during the great excitement 
of that memorable (Jay, pass and repass the sacred symbol of 
their country just for the sake of lifting their hats to the dear 
old flag. Blood is thicker than water — even if it was only a 
boat race. One young fellow who had been for four years 
studying his profession at Halle, in Germany, and had not 
seen the Gridiron during that time, doffed his hat twice and 
was cheered from the balcony in return ; and when he came to 



THE DEAR OLD FLAG. 



361 



me and spoke, his eyelashes were humid, and, when I asked 
him wliat was the matter, he answered in a polyglot of Deutsch 
and English : 

" Ach Gott! I've been having a blamed good cry at the sight 
of the Stars and Stripes." 

And thus the day passed, and the sun declined in force and 
fell in strips of silver and gold and purple on Putney church 
and steeple, and on all that mad, roaring, shouting, gambling, 
eating, and drinking multitude, that lined both banks of the 
river from Putney to Mortlake — a million human beings in 
all — to witness ten lads struggle for less than half an hour in 
two frail boats. 




1 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

STRUGGLE AND VICTORY. 




[s ^ S I passed down the towing path toward 
bK' the stone honse where the Harvard crew 



were resting, 1 saw the blue blades of four 
2 Mr^-^'^ •-: xV slender oars elevated above the crowd, and 
y ^ i ^ ^-is'Ssrs^ passing through the closely wedged ranks. 
The men who carried them, the Oxford Four, appeared on the 
river's bank — four fine looking young fellows, with tlie cox- 
swain, a mere lad, in their rowing suits. They were going to 
take a paddle preparatory to the race, for half a mile up the 
Thames toward the Duke of Devonshire's. They looked well, 
and were loudly cheered as they got into their boat. They 
paddled up the river. 

As I passed the gate of the stone house I saw the Chevalier 
Wykoff and George Wilkes standing together and spoke to 
them both. Just at this moment the face of Loring, the stroke 
of the Harvard crew, appeared looking out toward the river, 
which was packed witli boats full of people. There was some- 
thing in the man's face that I did not like. I had not seen 
liim for a few days previous. He had a huge boil under his 
right chin in his neck, with a white crust on the top of it ; his 
eyes seemed wild, his manner anxious and hurried, and alto- 
gether he seemed very unsteady. I shook hands with him and 
asked him how he felt. 

He said slowly, " Pretty well," and after we talked a few 
minutes he went in to prepare for the struggle. I stepped back 
to the towing path and spoke to Mr. Wilkes, who asked of me. 



ON BOARD THE PRESS BOAT. 363 

"Who is that? Is not that Mr. Loring, the Stroke of 
Harvard?" I answered in the affirmative. Mr. Wilkes then 
asked mc, " What did he say ? Does he feel well ?" I an- 
swered, " He says he feels pretty well ?" Wilkes burst out, 
" Pretty well ! He doesn't look like it. That man's sick." 
and in an instant he dashed into the crowd to find some one 
and I lost him for the time being. 

I walked down to the " Star and Garter" inn slowly, think- 
ing of the last look I had at Loring, and I felt astonished that 
lie should be ready to pull a race in his condition. The man 
was evidently in a state of exhaustion ; he looked overworked, 
overstrained, and out of condition for a four mile and three fur- 
long i-acc — he who had, when at his best, only been used to 
pull a three mile race, turning at a stake of a mile and a half 
distance. 

Warned by the noise and rapid movements of the crowd 
that something was astir, 1 made my way by the Star and 
and Garter, out of whose windows men were handing porter 
bottles to their friends beneath, and, walking to the river's bank, 
I hailed a boat with two Thames watermen in it, who pulled 
me tln-ough the line of Police boats to the Press boat Sun- 
jQowcr, which had her steam up and was getting ready. 

Getting on the deck 1 took a look around me. Above and 
at our back was the old Putney Bridge, thick with human 
beings of both sexes. Beneath were countless steamboats and 
small craft, wedged together in a dense mass, covering tho 
river behind the bridge for acres, and at our stern a huge iron 
chain of Vulcanic links stretched from the Star and Garter to 
a point off Fulliam on the Middlesex shore. The chain in tho 
middle of the river "v^'as under water, but near both shores it 
was visible to all the passengers on the steamboats behind Put- 
ney Bridge, but also impassable to them, however they might 
rage, fume, and curse at their ill-luck and guineas thrown 
away. 

By the side of the Press boat, the Umpire's boat — a craft 
similar in build and appearance — was anchored, many of the 
passengers wearing the rival colors ; the Americans drinking 



364 STRUGGLE AND VICTORY. 

brandy and soda to refresh themselves, and the Englislimen 
giving odds on Oxford with great good will and humor. 

The picture on the river was a most striking one, and worthy 
of a master's brush, witli its vivid color, the striking dresses 
of the crowds, the flags and bunting from housetops and steam 
funnels ; the green-leaved trees, their branches covered with 
human fruit, and the hot August sun, just losing its intensity, 
as a cool breeze came down from the direction of Mortlake to 
ruffle the surface of the river, its eddies and wavelets sparkling 
and dancing like diamonds of price. 

It was now within a few minutes of five o'clock. There was 
a sudden hum above on the river, at a place called the Crab 
Tree, as the Oxford crew got into their boat, and the hum be- 
came distinct and swelled into a pronounced noise, and the 
noise became a great solid, full cheer from a hundred thousand 
throats, as the briglit blue ))lades of the Oxford Four were 
dipped in the water, and they came paddling down the stream 
in their narrow shell to take position by the Umpire's boat near 
the bridge. They paddled easily, and took position with a 
quiet look in their fair English faces that impressed every 
American favorably. 

Then there was another hum as before, when tlie Harvard 
crew came down from the boat-house of tlie London Rowing 
Club, and a tremendous cheer as their boat came up to the 
Middlesex shore — in among the seedy long grass. 

And now let us look for a moment at the two crews as 
they sit there passively awaiting the order to "go." The Har- 
vard boat is long, narrow, and the frail cedar wood timbers 
that compose it are polished like a steel mirror. Its nose and 
bow are sharp as a lancet, and amidships it is but a few inches 
out of the water. So frail, and yet to carry the good or bad 
forlTine of a mighty nation's hci)e. 

The Harvard crew wore white flannel shirts, the sleeves cut 
away at the shoulders, with white drawers shortened above the 
ankles, and white fillets bound around their temples to save 
their heads from the sun's rays. To a spectator tliey looked 
magnificent — all of them brcnzed as they sat well forward in 



LORIXG S CONDITION. 365 

tlic Ijoat, their skins like a new guinea. Burnliam, the cox- 
swain, liad his back to the steamer and faced the stroke, Mr. 
Loring. Bnrnham looked stout, massive, and in good condi- 
tion. His l)road Lack, rather too broad for a coxswain, gave 
an idea of endurance and "staying" more useful in a stroke 
than a " cox." His face was tanned, and his quick, rest- 
less eyes scanned the broad Thames with a short, momentary 
glance, and then they rested on Simmons, the hope of the Amer- 
ican boat. 

Burnham wore a Vandyke tuft at his chin, and a stiff, brist- 
ling mustache of sandy hue. He looked old enough to be 
father to the Oxford coxswain. Loring sat with both hands 
grasping the stroke-oar on the right side of the boat. His 
face was turned also, and his dark eyes had something nervous 
and flitting in tliem that I did not like. His body was as lean 
as a greyhound\s — in fact, he was too lean for a long race. 
But tlie nuisclcs and sinews stood out in bold relief, and the 
cords of flesh between tlic shouldcr-l)lades wore hard, and, 
Loring being slightly round in the shoulders, it gave him a 
look of great strength, more fictitious than real. 

He wore a mustache and goatee — not quite so artistic in 
shape as Burnham's — and the hair was cropped close to his 
ears. His face, however, did not satisfy the Americans, who 
watched him closely. There was something that was indefi- 
nite, something unstrung, in the lines that should have been 
set and hardened like steel bars. He had a feverish look 
as he sat forward, with his long, massive arms, grasj)ing the 
oars. 

Simmons, the pride of the crew, sat beliind Loring, his per- 
fect physical form astounding the Englishmen by its massive 
and beautiful outline. The face was gravely handsome, the cliin 
round yet firm, the shoulders grand in their proportions, and 
the loins like the waist of an oak trunk. His naked arms were 
marble for their shape and purity of skin, and the neck, 
proudly resting upon his shoulders, could not have disgraced 
the Sun God. 

Take him altogether, I never saw such a perfect specimen 
23 



366 STRUGGLE AND VICTORY. 

of manhood and physical beauty as lie looked that day in the 
Harvard boat. And yet his eyes, usually intense and piercing, 
and bluish gray, which always looked a man in the face, were 
to-day yellowish and overcast. That lion heart, which could 
hardly think of defeat, was torn in a struggle to maintain 
composure. He and Loring for four days had been gradually 
weakening almost to the point of exhaustion, and these two 
men, upon whom the race principally depended, were per- 
fectly aware that their form was not good, and they were well 
aware, also, that without their strength and health the race 
was lost before it began. 

Simmonds towered above all his companions, and he held 
the wrist of his oar calmly as he could, while behind him sat 
Lyman, a grave, austere looking young gentleman, with a well 
cut face, mouth, and chin, dark hair, a resolute look, and a 
well shaped body ; of modest, but athletic look and determi- 
nation. 

Lyman seemed in very good shape, though a little anxious — 
as was no more than natural — about Loring and Simmonds, 
while the most insouciant, daring looking man in the boat to- 
day, is that haughty, imperious looking fellow who sits in the 
bow, Joseph Story Fay, a man of proud will, self confidence, 
and great endurance. He sits seeming a careless observer of 
the preparatory and technical part of the programme, but those 
keen, watchful eyes, that seem to stab like a knife, are bent 
with no little solicitude on the Oxford boat, which is almost 
stationary a few yards distant. 

The Harvard crew had a manly, bold look, taking them in a 
mass, and a sombre, matured appearance, their bodies and faces 
stained deep yellow, like a crew of Indians, and they also sat, 
if I may use the word, taller in their boat than the Oxford 
crew did in theirs. 

The Oxford crew were boyish, fresh-faced fellows, compared 
with them, their light skins and hair making them look more 
juvenile in appearance, and beside, they had not such an ascetic 
look as the Harvards, who had lived more like monks than 
athletes, without any amusement or even beer — for weeks 



CONDITION OF THE MEN. 367 

training themselves to death, and working body and mind too 
much. The Harvard crew seemed anxious and careworn, 
when their faces were studied, and they were certainly not in 
good training condition for the race. 

Loring had worked like a horse, pulling long distances in 
broiling suns ; and the crew when together had a bad fashion 
of rowing the whole course, while the Oxford men contented 
themselves with a pull of a couple of miles at a time, being 
careful not to overdo the business. Then, on Sunday the 
Oxford men always went down to the sea-shore at Brighton, 
and drank beer moderately and ate fruit in a jolly sort of a 
way, and plenty of roast meats, while the Harvard men lived 
to some extent on farinaceous food and porridge and figs 
and mutton, a favorite dish of theirs when roasted — and to be 
brief, they were too anxious to win, and the consequence came 
in the shape of a fidgctty, nervous, and overtrained condition. 

Besides, the stroke ot the Harvard crew was too labored 
and fiery and energetic to last, for tlie amount of powder be- 
longing to them. The arms were with them the great impell- 
ing power, and the recover was too high up in the chest, while 
the Oxford men recovered a little above the pit of the stomach, 
which is less wearisome and distressing. In catching the oar 
forward they ex|:)ended too much force, and spent a great deal 
of strength in dropping it, while their strength would have been 
better used in holding the water just before the recovery. 

The coxswain, too, was naturally uncertain of liis Stroke 
and Simmonds, both men being in poor condition ; and Loring 
told him before the race, in case that he flagged to sprinkle his 
face and that of Simmonds, with water. This alone was enough 
to make Burnham rather shaky, and not a little doubtful of his 
crew. A few lengths lost by wild steering or nervousness, and 
it would be of course impossible to win in the case of two 
crews so very closely matched otherwise. I say all this ad- 
visedly, and I am sure the conclusion will bear out my prem- 
ises. In addition, they had tried half a dozen boats while in 
training, and displaced two of their crew. Whether it was 



368 STRUGGLl'] AND VICTORY. 

wise to make this change or not, 1 liave no means of knowing, 
and cannot say. 

The Oxford crew having paddled their boat a little nearer 
the Press steamer, I now had a good look at them. They all 
had a fresli, fair, English look, and were not, as far as I could 
see, at ail fagged before going into the race. Darbishire, the 
Stroke, was the first man who caught my eye. He did not 
look at all burly in frame, and his figure was lower in the 
thwarts of the boat by a head, tiian that of the gigantic-framed 
Cornwall Celt, Mr. Tinne. 

Darbishire had a merry blue eye and a turn-up nose, indicat- 
ing good humor. His body was well set, his shoulders compact, 
and his hair, though short, had a proclivity to curl and kink. 
He had a broad forehead, a mouth a little turned down at tlie 
corners and arching, and his chin was moderately firm. 

Yarborough was far more determined in his look, and 
sported a pair of thin, mutton-chop whiskers. He was the 
darkest-skinned and darkest-eyed man in the Oxford boat, 
besides being a fine oarsman and a victor of many college 
matches. His nose was of the snub order, and the chin dim- 
pled, the forehead being broad and white, and the hair, like 
Darbishire's, inclined to curl. He was what would be a " big 
small" man, and was as compact and tough as a hickory nut. 

Tinne was, however, the giant of the crew. I never saw a 
more glorious looking fellow than this clear-skinned, handsome 
Cornwall lad, with his splendid clearly cut profile, frank, merry 
face, laughing eyes, and thoroughbred look. 

It was worth a day's walk to see Tinne pull. He was a man 
a good deal after the style of our own Simmonds, but not so 
gravely reserved. He was not as tall as Simmonds, but a 
great deal heavier, and looked as if he could pull a man-of- 
war's gig in a race, with those grand shoulders and hips broad 
ai a barrel of beer. Yet, with all his great physique, his gait 
was as light as a girl's, and the feather of his oar Avhen taken 
from the water was artistic in itself. 

This huge fellow, weighing 192 pounds on the day of the 
race, was formidable enough to intimidate the boldest betting 




THE OXFORD CKKW 



HALL, THE COXSWAIN. 371 

American of us all. Tiniie, like his friend Willan, the how 
oar, liad heen president of the Oxford University Boat Club, 
and had never known defeat. Willan, the Bow, looked as if the 
matter was mere play, while he amused himself with tlie oar 
and watched Walter Brown, who held the nose of the Harvard 
boat from a launch, with a keen alert look. His wliite Guern- 
sey shirt was open at the neck, and it showed a wonderfully 
muscular but white throat. His shoulders were broad across, 
and his fingers grasped the oar as if they were riveted with 
steel nails to the frail shaft. 

The most innocent looking boy I ever saw in a boat was Hall, 
a slight, frail, girlish looking lad, and coxswain of the Oxford 
crew. Weighing one hundred pounds on the day of the race, 
and being about seventeen years of age, he was the last person 
that a man would choose for a coxswain, who knew nothing 
of the mysteries and science of the art of rowing as practiced 
in England. His skin was light and almost transparent, the 
blue veins in his face being very prominent. His hair was 
very light, and his eyes blue as the sky. A handsomer lad 
could not be found, but he seemed delicate enough to Ije blown 
away with a breath. The face was weak, and the mouth of a 
curious shape, the corners being drawn down, and giving him 
a soft, credulous look. 

Looking at him there in his dark-blue jacket of thin flannel — 
all the rest of the crew were in white shirts cut away at the 
elbows, and white drawers shortened at the ankles — he looked 
so innocent and lady-like, that it needed Init a crinoline and 
silk skirt to transform him into a pretty English girl of the 
period. 

And yet that delicate boy had a great trust, and " Little 
Corpus," as he was called from his college at Oxford, well de- 
served it all, for his knowledge of the river Avas unrivaled, and 
his steering was simply perfection. Notliing could be finer. 
A New York betting-man, who lost heavily, declared that he 
was a " young weasel" for sagacity and cool nerve. 

By the time I had taken a good look at botli crews, the ar- 
rangements had all been made, and the two boats had been 



372 STRUGGLE AND VICTORT. 



^ 



brought by their coxswains up to a line stretched across the 
river, and the crews now lay in their boats, with bodies bent 
forward, their faces set, their oars grasped with energy, the 
coxswains with the ropes in both liands, and the stroke of each 
boat having liis oar blade poised a few feet above the water. 

Walter Brown held the nose of the Harvard boat, and John 
Phelps, a ragged looking Thames waterman, had his grip fast- 
ened on the Oxford boat, waiting for the word to go. Loring's 
eyes arc blazing with unwonted fire ; Darbishire seems confident 
and easy, with his ears dilated like a pointer, and a death-like 
silence reigns all over that swarming river — -just now the noise 
was deafening ; the Americans have ceased to drink any more 
brandy and soda ; Tom Huglies looks up the river to see if all 
is clear ; Mr. Lord, of the Thames Conservancy, reports all 
clear — and the bulky figure of Blakey, the starter of the race, 
is seen to ascend the paddle-box of the Lotus steamer, and his 
voice rings over the water, and is lieard with a thrill, for the 
decisive moment lias come at last. 

" I shall ask," says Blakey, " are you Ready — are you Ready ^ 
and if you do not stop me I shall give the word Go, after which 
God speed you both." 

" Are you ready ?" 

" No !" shouts Darbishire. 

" Are you ready ?" 

" No I" again, distinct and clear, from Darbishire. 

" Are you Ready T"* No answer this time from either crew. 

"GO!" 

A hundred thousand throats, as if made of cast-iron, bellow 
forth : a hundred thousand eyes are dazzled for a moment as 
the diamond drops fall from the upraised blue blades of Ox- 
ford and tlie white blades of Harvard. Walter Brown executes 
a war dance in an instant after he lias sent the Harvard shell 
a full length on its way. The 'Rah, 'Rah, 'Rah, of Harvard 
pierces the air; the masses on the banks of tlie river begin to 
show incipient symptoms of madness. Both boats are off, 
Harvard pulling like demons, and Oxford lias just got into 
her careless, easy swing, pumping away like machines. The 



harvard's lightning stroke. 373 

two steamers start on a helter-skelter race, and the greatest 
boat race the world ever saw has just begun for better or for 
worse. 

No man that day who witnessed the start of the two boats — 
the terrific spring of the Harvard crew, and the cool, rythmi- 
cal measure of the Oxford stroke — can ever forget that mo- 
ment of moments, unless, indeed, his blood be thinner than 
"water and his pulse of ice. The Harv^ard crew caught the 
water first, and were well on their w\ay before the crowds were 
recovered from the shock. Loring swept away like a tiger 
after his prey, and Buniham — who had won tlie toss for choice 
of position, steered in on the Middlesex shore, the Oxford 
crew having won a blank, and having to keep in, consequently, 
on the Surrey side — showing very good judgment at first, and 
keeping his boat well under way. It was but a miiuito, and 
Harvard was a full length clear in the water of the Oxford 
boat, Loring pulling forty-two strokes a minute, and Simmond's 
elbows going backward and forward like a steam engine. 

The Oxford crow, after a pause, recovered from their slight 
surprise, and fell into stroke as if a piece of mechanism were 
propelling their narrow shell. Darbishire is now rowing 
beautifully, and has settled down to hard work, while Tinne's 
great shoulders, bob up and down with superhuman energy, 
his glorious chest expanded to its full power, and he pulls with 
the magnificence of incarnate force, while " Little Corpus," the 
coxswain, is as quiet as a mouse, watching every stroke of the 
Harvard crew, as he sets in the stern sheets of tlie Oxford shell. 

Oxford has started with thirty-eight strokes, and now, when 
Mr. Darbishire sees oring putting on the steam at forty-four, 
he quickens his stroke to thirty-nine, and Hall gets the boat 
headed a little toward the Middlesex shore. 

The Star and Garter is fast disappearing from the stern of 
the Press boat, and the Umpire's boat follows closely, neck and 
neck almost. The crowds at a place called the " Creek," where 
a little stream runs tributary to the Thames, are shouting 
" Oxford " all their might and main. Fay, in the bow of the 
Harvard boat, seems to hear the taunt, and begins to show 



374 STRUGGLE AND VICTORY. 

evidence of his strength, by pulling the bow-side fyound 
slightly, which compels Burnham to put his rudder down and 
keep off from the Oxford boat. 

At Simmond's boat-liouse the jam is tremendous, and the 
crowd cheers Harvard as she sweeps by a length ahead ; and 
Oxford going a few feet wild at this point, the Harvard men on 
the two steamers shout themselves hoarse, and one man with a 
Magenta-ribbon takes off a new hat, carefully inspects it for a 
moment, and then in a delirium of frenzy kicks the crown of 
it in, and presents it skyward as a peace offering. 

The people on the Surrey towing-path seem all mad, Oxford 
is not showing speed enougli for them, and the stands and 
shows and bootlis are deserted as if they had never been in 
existence, the crowds pressing forward to the bank of the river 
wildly. Passing the "Willows," a pleasant little grove of trees, 
with a quaint stone house nestled in their bosom, a loud cheer 
is given as tlie Oxonians spurt a little, while at the same time 
the water falls, or rather daslies from Loring's oar with in- 
creased vehemence, for Harvard is now pulling at the tremend- 
ous pace of 45 strokes a miinite, a thing unheard of before in 
an English boat race. 

At " Craven Cottage" Oxford gains slightly, but the fact is 
hardly noticed by tlie Harvard men, who can see but one thing, 
and that is the Harvard boat, now ahead by a length anj:l a 
half. I never imagined that Loring could do the work he is 
now doing, which is superhuman, and therefore cannot last. 
At the "Soap "Works," a crazy old place, Darbishire seems to 
be creeping up, and his stroke is most assuredly telling on the 
Harvard energy and fire. Oxford is now pulling 40, and the 
cheers are deafening from the shore, while cries and exclama- 
tions and yells of encouragement come from the countless 
wlierries, stationary barges, and craft of all kinds that line the 
Surrey side. 

" Well pulled, Willnn. Nobly done for Exeter," shouts an 
excited Oxford University man from a small boat. " You are 
sure to win." 



burnham's bad steering. 377 

"Oh, go it Harvard; go it Harvard. 'Rah — 'Rah — 'Rah — 
'Rah. Hit her up, Loring." 

" Keep your steam on, Burnham. Don't get frightened." 

" What's the matter with Harvard, now," says a Harvard 
man to a dignified English gentleman on the Press boat. 

" Wonderful stroke, sir ; 'fraid it can't last. Great power, 
sir, in the Oxford crew," says the old gentleman rather curtly. 

" Well done, Simmonds, you are the man for my money," 
cries a Western man who has a bottle of soda water in his 
hand, and has been betting heavily all the way down the river 
on the boat. 

Opposite the " Doves," Harvard goes away splendidly from 
Oxford ; but now the Harvard men on the steamboats begin to 
notice something queer in the steering of Burnham. Briefly, 
he is steering wide of his race, and very badly, and his nerve 
seems to be going, for the boat looks quite unsteady and veers 
in the water more than she ought to. Now we are rounding a 
bend in the river, and the great, single span of Hammersmith 
Bridge looms up before us. Every coigne of vantage on this 
immense pile, from one side of the river to the other, is cover- 
ed with vehicles, broughams, carriages, 'busses, and at least 
thirty thousand people are clustered and hanging on to the 
structure in a most astonishing manner. It was a mad sight, 
that bridge, with the great swaying masses, pushing, shouting, 
and fighting to get a look at tlie boats. 

Cries of "Hoxford," "Hoxford," come down from above our 
heads as we near the bridge, and the excitement is perfectly 
terrific. We have nlready passed a quarter of a million of 
people, to estimate tlicm in the rough, and still they line tlie 
banks above us in impenetrable masses. The waving of hand- 
kerchiefs and shouting is enough to make a man lose his 
senses, if the race did not claim so much attention from the 
si)ectators. 

Harvard prepares to shoot under the liridge, l)cing still a 
length and a half ahead, but Loring is not doing his work so 
stoutly now, although the HaiTai'd boat glides through the 



378 STRUGGLE AND VICTORY. 

water at 46 strokes a minute. The pace is too hard and it 
will not and cannot last five minutes longer. 

Oxford steers out from the Surrey bank to shoot the bridge, 
and "Little Corpus" makes a circuit to avoid an eddy where 
the tide is bad, while Burnham is mad enough to go away from 
the race by giving room to Darbishirc's boat, whose coxswain 
never loses an inch by weak or ill-judged steering, Burnham 
going out of his way too much to accommodate Oxford, in- 
stead of keeping on and taking Oxford's water in a direct line. 
It was at this place that Harvard lost the race, wholly by Burn- 
ham's bad steering and Loring's nervousness. 

"Oh, my God! what are you doing Burnham, why do you 
steer so ?" shouts an excited Yale man in the Press boat think- 
ing vainly that Burnham will hear him ; but Harvard is too 
far on our bow to hear the warning voice, and here she loses a 
full half length. The excitement is now beyond description. 
From all the vast stagings that are erected on the Surrey side, 
decorated with English bunting and covered with thousands of 
people, comes a glad swell of triumph, borne on the breeze, 
and striking despair to every American heart. 

Now, at this moment, after shooting Hammersmith bridge, 
Loring's oar seems to hang loosely from the gimwale of the 
boat, and his head is bent forward as if he were al)Out to faint. 
In an instant the coxswain, Burnham, dashes water into his 
face and chest, and repeats the ablution five or six times, throw- 
ing the water also on Simmonds, who is weakened from the 
pace he has been pulling. 

The Harvard stroke now goes down to 42, to 41, and to 40 ; 
for Loring is knocked up, and the pulling is being done by Fay, 
on the bow side, in despair. Elliott, the boat-builder, stand- 
ing on the paddle-box of the Lotus, is black in tlie face from 
shouting, " Harvard ! Harvard!" "Pull up Harvard!" 

There goes that same steady, wonderful, glorious stroke of 
Oxford, like the knell of doom, not to be stopped until victory 
perches on her gallant crew. At Chiswick Island Loring 
spurted and made a despairing effort ; but the man is sick and 
gone for the race, and it is no use hallooing now, for Oxford 



I 



oxford's vengeance stroke. 379 

forges past the Harvard boat with a will and power that calls 
forth a shout from the assembled multitude, which rings in the 
ears of Loring's crew like a sentence of death. 

Still the gallant fellows struggle on, inspired by an agony 
which none may describe in such a race, and they never falter 
for an instant, but pull as if they were determined to win. 
During the first mile and a half of the race, Burnham received 
the back wasli of the Oxford boat, by keeping all the time in a 
line behind Darbishire's crew with a seeming blunder that ac- 
tually called tears of rage to the eyes of Americans on the 
steamboats. Getting along by Chiswick Church, which was 
crowded with people, the Oxford crew pulling 40, their boat 
was a length ahead of the Harvard bow oar, and Hall, the cox- 
swain, took care that no ground should be lost by his steering. 
Then Darbisliire spoke the word to his crew, and throwing all 
the powder they could into their backs, they gave Harvard only 
the alternative of pulling to Barnes's Bridge for an honorable 
defeat. 

Never for a moment did Oxford flag, but kept the stroke as 
if grim death was at their heels, yet all the time throughout 
the race they seemed easy in their style, and regular as the 
pendulum of an eight-day clock. 

The want of time and catch in the Harvard stroke was very 
noticeable at Barnes's Bridge, and here the same immense 
crowds were gathered as at the bridge at Hammersmith, and 
now the Oxford boat being positively a length and a half ahead, 
and no mistake, the cries and shouts were most appalling. Past 
the green fields in the Duke of Devonshire's meadows a large 
crowd was gathered, who hailed the appearance of the Oxford 
crew with great and significant pleasure. 

The race was now lost, virtually. Harvard was out of time 
— knocked u}3 — and the men in her boat were laboring like 
oxen in chains. Tlic morale of the Harvard crew was gone a 
mile below Barnes's Bridge, when Loring's oar hung loose for 
the first time, and nothing human could now give old Massa- 
chusetts a victory. It was a gallant struggle, too, and nobly 
waged. Passing the " White Cottage " and the " White Hart " 
in tlie race for the Ship Tavern at Mortlake, the Harvard crew, 



380 STRUGGLE AND VICTORY. 

in tlie last quarter of a mile, put on a desperate spurt and row- 
ing for a minute and a half" at 44 strokes, they gained ground 
on Oxford, whose crew seemed as fresh as when they began. 

Now is the last desperate struggle. Pull, Harvard ; you can- 
not hope to win. Pull, Harvard, and pluck the sting from de- 
feat ! Both crews go at it for a minute, and Loring's last spark 
of fire is given to drive his boat through the water. There is 
a shout from the Ship Tavern, where the American flag is dis- 
played. Oxford comes by with tliat terrible vengeance stroke, 
the terror of many a gallant Cantab oarsman. There is a 
shout which splits the clouds almost, a report of a gun, and 
Oxford has struck the tow line, a boat and a half's length 
ahead, (not three lengtlis ahead as was reported,) the race is 
lost and won, by about 65 feet, and the most gallant display 
ever seen on the Thames is over, and the dark blue swarms go 
home .triumphant at heart. Bridges, river bank, and church 
steeple are deserted, as tlie Oxford crew paddle their boat along 
side of the Harvard crew, and, raising their hands in air, give 
the defeated oargimen a hearty English cheer and shake hands 
with them, and the Harvard boys cheer back, and Charles 
Reade, who stands on the deck of the steamer Lotus, lifts his 
straw hat in respect to Loring, who smiles back sadly at him, 
and all is over. The children's children of those two crews 
will yet tell of that day's struggle, which for one hour served 
to call back tlie Homeric days of Greece. 

The distance pulled by the Harvard and Oxford crews was 
four miles and three furlongs, without any turning at a stake 
boat. The day was a very warm one, the thermometer being 
at 87° Fahrenheit — in the shade. 

The names and weight of the crews were as follows : 

OXFORD UNIVERSITY. HARVARD UNIVERSITY. 

1. Darbishire, (stroke) 160 lbs. 1. Loring, (stroke) 154 lbs. 

2. Yarborough, 170 " 2. Simmonds, 170 " 

3. Tinne, 192 " 3. Lyman, 155 " 

4. Willan, (bow) 166 " 4. Fay, (bow) 155 '* 
Hall, coxswain, 100 " Burnham, coxswain, 112 " 

788 746 



BEATEN BY EIGHT SECONDS. 



381 



The time occupied by both crews in pulling tlie race was as 
follows : 

Oxford, ... 22 minutes 20 seconds. 

Harvard, . . . . 22 " 26 " 

Both crews did tlieir best, but the Oxford style of rowing, 
and their form, was superior to that of Harvard. Rowing 
with a coxswain will one day supersede the Harvard bow-steer- 
ing. The Harvard crew received perfect fair-play and courtesy, 
and all the stories to the contrary which have been circulated 
are untrue. 





CHAPTER XXY. 

THE CURIOSITIES OF L( .'fDON. 

MOST venerable relic — none more bo in 
London — is the Domesday Book, which I 
was allowed to inspect one day while saun- 
tering through the Chapter House of West- 
minster Abbey. This hoary volume is called 
the "Domesday Book," or, "Register of 
the Lands of England," and was made in the year 1086, almost 
in the morning of English history. 

There are two volumes of the " Domesday Book," one being 
a folio and the dther a quarto. A fee of a shilling is 
charged strangers, to inspect the musty old tomes, with their 
illuminated characters, which detail the various "messuages," 
" folkmotcs," " carucates," and " hydes," of land, which were 
divided among Norman "William's mail clad barons, by right 
of conquest, nearly a thousand years ago. 

These volumes are the oldest in England, although I have 
been informed that tliere are, in the Bodleian Library, at Ox- 
ford, two books, in Greek characters, which were saved from 
the destruction of the Alexandrian Library in the Ninth Cen- 
tury. 

One of the Domesday volumes is a very large folio, the other 
is a quarto. The quarto is written on 382 double pages of 
vellum, in one and the same hand, in small but jilain cliarac- 
ters, each page having double columns. Some of the capital 
letters and principal pages are touched with black ink, and 
others are crossed with lines of red ink. The second volume, 



THE DREADNOUGHT. 383 

in folio, is ■vn-itten in 450 pages of vellum, but in single col- 
umns, occupying each page, and in a large, fair character. At 
the end of the second vohmie is the following memorial, in 
capital letters, of the time of its completion : 

"Anno Millesimo Octogesimo Sexto ab Incarnatione Domini, 
vigesimo vero regni Willielmi, facta est ista Descriptio, non 
solum per hos tres Comitatus, sed etiam per alios." 

These books, until the year 1G96, or for over six hundred 
years, were carried innumerable times from place to place, 
tlirough England, under strong guards, within the jurisdiction of 
the various Lord Chancellors, and Courts, to settle disputes 
and verify local records and documents, in regard to the trans- 
mission of real estate, for every acre of land owned to-day in 
England is held by the original tenure, given in Domesday Book. 

Since 1696 the book has been kept with the King's Seal, 
at Westminster, in the Exchequer, under three locks and keys 
in the charge of the Auditor, the Chamberlain, and Deputy 
Chamberlains of the Exchequer. It is kept in a vaulted porch 
never warmed by fire. For eight hundred years it has never 
felt or seen a fire, and yet the pages are bright, sound, and per- 
fect as ever. In making searches, or transcripts from the vol- 
ume, the text must not be touched, and this has always been 
the rule from forgotten days. All the cities, towns, and 
villages of England are recorded in this book, with their value, 
location, and boundaries, their castles, fortresses, marches, and 
the religious houses of the Kingdom, as they stood twenty 
years after Duke William, of Normandy, reined in his war 
horse from the slaughter of Hastings' dread field. 

Tlie Hospital Ship " Dreadnought," (soon to be broken up 
and sold,) which lies moored off Greenwich, in the dirty Thames, 
is another of the curious sights of London. An hospital for the 
sick and diseased seamen of all nations arriving in tlie port of 
London, was establislied on board of the " Grampus," a 50 gun 
frigate, in 1821, l)ut the "Grampus" did not prove large 
enough for the purix)se,and the next vessel chosen was the 104 
gun three-decker " Dreadnought," which was fitted up in 1831, 
as an Hospital Ship. This old hulk has glorious memories for 



384 



THE CURIOSITIES OF LONDON. 



all Englislimcn, who, as tlicy look at licr rotting timbers, can 
imagine that they see her coming out of the smoke of Trafal- 
gar fight, after capturing tlie Spanisli three-decker, " San Juan," 
which had, two hours before, beaten off the English frigates, 
"Bellerophon" and "Defiance." 




HOSPITAL SHIP, DREADNOUGHT. 

The establishment on board of the "Dreadnought" consists 
of a Superintendent, two Surgeons, an Apothecary, Visiting 
Physicians, and a Chaplain. The ship is moored contiguous 
to the bulk of the shipping in the docks, and in the river, and 
is tlie only place in London for the reception of sick seamen 
arriving from abroad, or to whom accidents may happen be- 
tween the mouth of the river and London Bridge. Sick sea- 
men of every nation, on presenting themselves alongside, are 
immediately and kindly received without any recommendatory 
letters, and shii>wrecked sailors, and vagrant seamen, are ad- 
mitted, if deserving. In 1869, 2,463 patients were received on 
board, and 1,836 seamen were attended to as out patients. 

The Emperor of Russia subscribes annually <£ 150, the Queen 
of Spain £100, the King of Italy XlOO, the Emperor of France 



A GAUDY SHOW. 385 

£200, the Sultan of Turkey £100, the King of Denmark £50, 
and the King of Prussia X100. I heard nothing of a contri- 
bution from the American Government, but it is probable that 
the American Consul may, in some way, provide for the desti- 
tute seamen of his country. 

The patients are ranged upon the lower decks, the portholes 
affording a sort of ventilation, such as it is — the breeze com- 
ing in from the putrid Thames' river, and in the cabin are all 
the implements of surgery, so that a leg or arm can be whipped 
off at a moment's notice, or an abscess, or ulcer, may be 
punctured equally quick. 

Visitors can inspect the " Dreadnought" on any day of the 
week, excepting Sunday — between the hours of eleven and three. 

The number of seamen cared for in this floating hospital, for 
the past thirty years, with their different places of nativity, is 
as follows : 

Englishmen, 84,600 ; Scotchmen, 18,960 ; Irishmen, 17,325 ; 
Frenchmen, 3,911 ; Germans, 2,800; Russians, 2,230; Prus- 
sians, 1,840; Hollanders, 480 ; Danes, 1,600; Swedes, 2,117 ; 
Norwegians, 1,604; Italians, 1,208; Portuguese, 706; Span- 
iards, 801; East Indians, 2,014; West Indians, 3,212; British 
Americans, 1,582; United States, 3,316; South Americans, 
712; Africans, 1,200; Turks, 174; Greeks, 295; New Zea- 
landers, 98 ; Australians, 307 ; South Sea Islanders, 80 ; Chi- 
nese, 347 ; born at sea, 206. 

Generally there are about two hundred patients in the float- 
ing Hospital at a time, and it is kept pretty full, from the fact 
that a poor sailor will jierish afloat sooner than enter a land 
hospital, and seamen often travel from the most distant parts 
of England, Ireland, and Scotland, to be received in the Dread- 
nought. 

One day, while standing on Cheapside looking at the busy 
thoroughfare, which much resembles Broadway, New York, in 
its main features, I saw a queerly-shaped, but magnificent 
vehicle dash by, embellished in gold and silver, and hung 
with crimson velvet. 
24 



386 THE CURIOSITIES OF LONDON. 

I asked a bystander Avliat it was, and he answered with 
projxjr British pride : 

"Why, don't you know? That's the Queen's State Kerridge 
a-goin to tlic Tower to he repaired." 

I afterward saw tliis vehicle in all its glory and detail, and 
for the benefit of Americans who may desire to get up a gorgeous 
equipage, I will do my best to describe it. 

The carriage is composed of four Sea Tritons, who support 
the body by cables ; the two placed on the front, as it were, 
bear the driver, (a most magnificent flunkey in powder and 
velvet,) and arc sounding shells, and those on the back part 
carry the bundles of Lictors rods which are seen on Roman monu- 
ments and medals. The foot board on which the driver rests his 
noble feet, is a large scallop shell, supported l)y marine plants of 
different kinds. The pole resembles a bundle of lances, and 
tlie wheels are made in imitation of the war chariots which 
once rolled around classic arenas in the Games. The body of 
the coach is composed of eight palm trees, which, branching 
out at the top, sustain the roof, and at each angle are trophies 
of English battles by land and sea. 

On the top of the roof are three little figures of fairies rep- 
resenting England, Ireland, and Scotland, supporting a golden 
crown, and holding the sceptre, the sword of state, and insig- 
nia of knighthood, and from their bodies fall festoons of laurel 
to the four corners of the roof. 

On the right and left doors, and on the back and front pan- 
ncls, arc painted allegorical designs in splendid style, repre- 
senting Britannia on a Throne, Religion, Wisdom, Justice, 
Valor, Fortitude, Commerce, Plenty, Victory, and all the otlicr 
virtues and acquisitions which all Englishmen flatter them- 
selves can only be found in " Britain ye knaw." 

Inside the State Coach it is simply magnificent. Tlie body is 
lined, with S3arlct embossed velvet, superbly laced and embroi- 
dered with the Star, enameled by the Collar of the Order of the 
Garter, and surmounted by the crown with tlie George and 
Dragon pcddant. St. George, St. Michael, and even St. Pat- 



THE queen's state COACH. 387 

rick, get a show here, althougli the latter has very litQc show 
from the Queen in his own country. 

The hamracr cloth is of scarlet velvet, with gold badges, 
ropes, and tassels. The length of the carriage and body is 24 
feet,width8 feet 3 inches, height 12 feet, length of pole 12 feet, 
weight four tons. So that the Queen, when she desires a state 
airing, is carted around for the amusement of her subjects, in 
a four-ton vehicle. The painting of the panels cost X800, or 
about $4,000 greenbacks. The eight liorscs which are em- 
ployed to draw this magnificent carriage on state occasions, 
arc valued at .£2,000, and the expense for grooms, drivers, 
coachmen, and boys, of this equipage, which is not used more 
than once in five years, (and when not used being chiefly of ser- 
vice in showing off the manly proportions of John Brown,) is 
for every year over $25,000, or as much as the salary of the 
President of the United States. Tlic Queen's coach is one 
hundred and eight years old, and is kept in the Royal Mews or 
Stables at Pimlico. 

The bill which a loyal peo})le had to pay when it was sent 
in for this coach, was as follows : 

Coachmakcr (incliuling ^Vllcebvrigl^t and Smitli), 
Carver, . . _ . . 

Gilder, ---__- 
Painter, - - - - - 

Laceman, ------ 

Chaser, 

Harnessmaker, - - - - - 

Mercer, - - _ - _ 

Belt maker, - - - . . 

Milliner, - - - - _ 

Saddler, ------ 

Woollendraper, . _ . . 

Covermaker, - - - _ - 

£7528 4 3} 

There was an awful row about the size of the bill, which was at 
first £8,000, but after a great argument it was cut down to the 
amount paid, .£7,528 4 3^. The maker refused to take off the 
three-half pence, and declared tliat he had been " skinned and 



£1C37 15 





2500 





935 14 





315 





737 10 


7 


GG5 4 


6 


385 15 





202 5 


10^ 


99 6 


e" 


31 3 


4 


10 16 


G 


4 3 


6 


3 9 


G 



388 THE CURIOSITIES OF LONDON. 

robbed," but I imagine it was the poor miserable wretches 
who died of starvation and cold and exposure in the London 
streets that had the best right to complain. 

The Lord Mayor's State Coach, which was built in 1757, is 
almost as magnificent as the Queen's, and is designed in fully 
as good or bad taste. I do not know which to call it. 

To show how the people of England tolerate the most out- 
rageous humbugs on the face of the earth, I will give some of 
the items in regard to tlie cost of the Lord Mayor's coach. 
When the coacli was built, one hundred and thirteen years ago, 
each alderman in the city subscribed <£60 towards its construc- 
tion ; then each alderman who was afterward sworn into 
ofhce, was forced to contribute <£60 on taking the oath. And 
each Lord Mayor also gave XlOO on entering his office, to keep 
the coach in order. In 1768 the entire expense of keeping 
the coach fell on the Lord Mayor, who had to pay X 300 during 
that year, and twenty years after its construction, the coach 
cost in 1787, £355 to keep it in order for that twelve months. 
During seven years of this present century, the cost for repairs 
was per annum — £115, and in 1812 it was newly lined and gilt 
for the benefit of the gaping London crowds, at an expense 
of £600, and a new seat cloth was furnished for £90 ; and 
again in 1821, this costly vehicle devoured the bread which 
ouglit to have been eaten by the starving poor, to the tune of 
£206 for another relining. In 1812 a carriage-making firm 
agreed to keep the coach in order for ten years at an expense 
to the city of £48 a year, which offer was accepted. The real 
amount of money swallowed up in this old lumbering vehicle 
is incalculable. Six horses are required to draw it, valued 
at £200 a piece, and the coach weighs 7,600 pounds. A Lord 
Mayor, when well fed and taken care of, weighs, I believe, 
about 312 pounds. The harnesses for each of the six horses 
weighs 106 pounds, or 636 pounds in all. 

The State Coach belonging to the Speaker of the House of Com- 
mons, was built for Oliver Cromwell, and is drawn by two horses. 

The two sheriffs of London have also State Coaches, bur- 
nished and blazoned with gold, and hung with silks and vel- 



JONATHAN wild's SKELETON. 



389 



vets, and althougli they only receive X 1,000 for their year's 
services, the expense of state coaches, horses, liveries, and 
drivers, never falls below 2,500 guineas for their term. They 
are not allowed to serve if they swear themselves to be worth 
over £15,000, or $75,000. 

The ceremony of installing a London sheriff I am afraid 
would make a New York Sheriff howl, and much profanity 
would result were the ancient ceremonies to become necessary 
at the City Hall of New York. I give the curious form of in- 
stallation of a Sheriff of London. 

The sheriffs are chosen by 
the Livery Companies or Trade 
Associations of London, on 
the morning of the Feast of St. 
Michael, and are presented in 
the Court of Exchequer, ac- 
companied by the Lord Mayor 
and all the Aldermen, when 
the Recorder of London intro- 
duces the two sheriffs, one for 
London proper, and the other 
for Middlesex County, and the 
Chief Judge in his red robes, 
signifies the Queen's assent, 
handing the sheriff's" roll" — 
a sheet of paper which has 
had the names of the sheriffs 
pricked in by the Queen's own 
hand, tlie writs and appliances 
are read and filed, and the sheriffs and senior under-sheriffs 
take the oaths ; when the late sheriffs present their accounts. 
The crier of the court then makes proclamation for one who 
does homage for the slieriffs of London to " stand forth and do 
his duty ;" when the senior alderman below the chair rises, 
the usher of the court hands him a bill-hook, and holds in both 
hands a small bundle of slicks, winch the alderman cuts asunder, 
and then cuts another bundle with a hatchet. Similar procla- 




JONATHAN AVILD S SKELETON. 



390 THE CURIOSITIES OF LONDON. 

mation is then made for the sheriff of Middlesex, when the 
alderman counts six horse-shoes lying upon the table, and six- 
ty-one liob-nails handed in a tray ; and the numbers are declared 
twice. 

The sticks are tliin peeled twigs tied in a bundle at each end 
with red tape ; the horse-shoes are of large size, and very old ; 
the hob-nails are supplied fresh every year. By the first cere- 
mony the alderman does suit and service for the tenants of a 
manor in Shropshire, the chopping of sticks betokening 
the custom of the tenants supplying their lord with fuel. The 
counting of the horse-shoes and nails is another suit and ser- 
vice of the owners of a forge in St. Clement Danes, Strand, 
which formerly belonged to the city, but no longer exists. 
Sheriff Hoare, in his MS. journal of his shrievalty, 1740-41, 
says, " where the tenements and lands are situated no one 
knows, nor doth the city receive any rents or profits thereby." 

In the Town Hall or Guildhall of London, some very strange 
relics are preserved, but none can be more strange than the 
yellow faded parchment shown me on which was written the 
humble petition of that notorious rascal and thief-taker, Jona- 
than Wild, who had first trained Jack Sheppard to thievery, 
after which he entrapped and hung him. "Well, this very vir- 
tuous old gentleman had the audacity to send a petition to 
the Court of Aldermen in the year 1724, praying for the free- 
dom of the City in view of the benefit he had conferred on it 
by the apprehension of so many thieves who had returned from 
transportation. 

One day while paying a visit to a celebrated surgeon, whose 
residence is at Windsor, I was invited to look into his closets, 
in whicli were stored a number of curiosities. Suddenly a 
door in a recess of the chamlicr flew open, and out popped a 
skeleton on wires, with a ghastly, grinning jaw, and its ribs 
all open like the timbers of a wrecked ship. 

" That's the skeleton of Jonathan Wild," said the surgeon, 
" It has been in our family for a hmidred years, I believe." 




CHAPTER XXVI. 

STREET SIGHTS OF LONDON. 

ERY strange sights are seen in London. No 
city tliat I have ever visited will compare with 
London for the number of its street peddlers, 
hawkers, booth proprietors, open-air perform- 
ers, ballad singers, mountebanks, and other 
street itinerants. 

From daybreak until dark, and long into the night, 
in the ramification of Streets and Lanes, Squares, 
Mews, and Ovals, the ear of the stranger is saluted with 
the harshest and most discordant sounds which emanate 
from the throats of a street-selling population of both sexes, 
large enough alone to make the population of a fifth-rate 
city. 

The London Cockney who has heard the , same grating sounds 
from tlie days of his earliest childhood, never stops in his 
walk to listen to the cries, but the stranger in London is com- 
pelled by the very want of melody or intelligibility in the 
hawker's cries to listen, yet it is useless for him to attempt to 
solve the meaning of their uncouth and barbarous gibberagc. 

For these seventy-five thousand men, women, and boys, as well 
as girls, many of a tender age — have their several dialects, and 
signals, and patois, which it would be madness to try to under- 
stand without a thorough schooling in the rudiments of their 
language and several occupations. 

Li another part of this work I have taken a glance at the 
London Costermongers and their habits and amusements, such 
as they are. 



•392 STREET SIGHTS OF LONDON. 



1 



Beside this, the largest and most hard-working class of street 
hawkers, there are a hundred other branches of street mer- 
chandise, and all these different branches have their followers, 
who navigate every quarter of the metropolis, trying to pick 
up a shilling here and there from the sale of their commodi- 
ties, as luck or energy may chance to send the shilling their 
way. 

It is calculated that the gross receipts of the street peddlers 
of London amount to as much as £5,000,000 a year. This 
would make an average of X 70 a year, or nearly $500 for each 
person engaged in street peddling. Of course in this aggre- 
gate I must include all those who keep stands or booths of a 
greater or lesser magnitude. 

Some of these poor wretches may earn in good weeks about 
fifteen to twenty shillings, while at other seasons when green 
stuff is scarce, it is rarely that they exceed more than eight 
shillings on an average for the same amount of labor and 
hawking. 

Ten shillings, however, is a fair week's earning if that 
amount be realized during the current year. It may be calcu- 
lated that the profits will average as high as <£ 1,500,000 where 
the gross receipts for sales are as high as .£5,000,000. 

A bitter hostility exists between the tradesmen who occupy 
shops and pay what they consider to be exorbitant rents, and 
the street sellers. No sooner has a street seller made a round 
of custom for himself and advertised his wares sufficiently, 
than the blue- coated policeman is sure to appear, armed with 
the authority which cannot be disobeyed, and he is compelled 
to move his stand or barrow. 

The hawker or peddler is forced to pay four or five pounds 
a year for a license to sell in this precarious way, and yet in 
London he has no legal right to occupy a stand or booth. He 
has always to move on, like the boy Joe in Bleak House. 

It is more than wonderful to think of the shifts made by the 
poor classes of London to make a living. 

The rich man passes by objects in the crowded streets every 
day with scorn or loathing, which serve to yield a sustenance 



SECOND-HAND BOOTS AND SHOES. 393 

to the indigent population, and even the offal of the streets 
■will bring a price when offered for sale. The work of the 
class who gather this material is generally done before daybreak, 
and in some cases their earnings are considerable. 

The second-hand metal and tool sellers are to be found 
chiefly as proprietors of booths or barrows in the vicinity of 
Petticoat and Rosemary Lanes. The street trade of the city 
is, to a great extent, done by those who have barrows, and 
as it is convenient for them to move their barrows from 
place to place, the costermongers are found all over the me- 
tropolis. 

I made it my business to go almost incessantly among those 
street hawkers, and I got from them a vast amount of useful 
information, and a great many statistics. 

Some of them tell curious stories, and have considerable 
wit of a coarse kind, but to the wandering American they are, 
with few exceptions, very civil, and will relate their checkered 
life-histories with great eagerness. 

Tliere are hundreds of old boot and shoe shops and stands, 
where a great business is carried on in the mending, patching, 
and vending of old shoes and boots. 

In one branch of the street trade alone, it will be interesting 
to give some statistics which may be deemed reliable, as liav- 
ing been collected by Mr. Henry Mayhew. There are shops 
and stands included in this trade alone — 

In Drury Lane and streets adjacent, 
Seven Dials, ^ " - . . 

Monmouth Street, " "... 

Hanway Court, Oxford Street, . , . 

Lisson-grove, " " _ - . 

Paddington, " « - . . 

Petticoat Lane, " "... 

Somerstown, . _ . . . 

Field Lane, Saffron Hill, - - - . 

Clerkenwell, - - - . . 

Bethnal Green, SpitalfieWs - - . 

Rosemary Lane and vicinity, . - _ 

744 shops. 



50 


shops, 


100 


(( 


40 


.( 


4 


« 


100 


« 


30 


(( 


200 


n 


60 


« 


40 


(( 


50 


« 


100 


« 


80 


« 



394 STREET SIGHTS OF LONDON. 

About two thousand five hundred men are employed mend- 
ing and patching shoes. Then there are hundreds of poor 
men and women who gain subsistence, but barely subsistence, 
by collecting the old material of all articles that are made of 
leather, and selling it to those who keep shops or stands. 

I visited the lodgings of a man, in Cutler street, who paid 
his landlord a weekly rent of Is. 8d. for the use of one bare 
room, which had no furniture with the exception of a three- 
legged chair upon which he sat — and a heap of straw and dirty 
rags, which served him as a bed. On the bare mantel-piece 
was a broken loaf of brown-bread, and a cooked kidney, with a 
broken mustard-pot. 

The man was named Ferguson, and had only one eye, 
the other having been obliterated by the small pox. He 
was a cheerful old fellow, tliis peddler of second-hand boots and 
shoes, and seemed to take the world as it came without thought 
of the morrow. I told him that I was in search of information, 
and statistics in regard to the working people of London, and 
he offered me very politely his only stool. I declined the cour- 
tesy and sat on the heap of rags while he told his story. 

"Ye need not be afeered of the bugs, yer honor, in the bed. 
The place is not warm enough for them to stay here. 

" Stistiks ye want is it ? Well, I don't know how I can 
give ye stistiks, but I can tell you my own story. 

" I began life a shoemaker's apprentice, in Edinburgh, al- 
though I am by birth an Englishman. My master's name was 
Mac Donald, and when he drank whiskey his temper generally 
ruz, and the divil could n't stand him or get the better of him. 
So I listed for a soldier and went to furrin parts, and after I 
sarved my time I came back a good deal wiser but not a penny 
richer of it all. 

" I had my ups and downs when I came back, but I didn't 
marry, as it was too bad to bring another person into poverty 
besides myself. I've smoked a pipe when I was troubled in 
mind and could not get a bite to eat, or a drop of gin to drink, 
but how would it be if 1 liad a young daughter? What good 
would it do to smoke if she wos hungry and I had notliing to 



THE DOG FANCIER. 395 

eat for her. I used to sell cherries and strawl)erries, and then 
I gave that up and went into the old shoe trade. It paid het- 
ter, but sometimes I had n't a penny-piece for two days at a 
time, and I would have to sell my stock to get my grub. 

" The regular sort of men's shoes are not a werry good sale. 
I gets from ten-pence to five shillings a pair, but the high priced 
ones is always soled or heeled and covered with mud. I gets 
from one shilling to twa-and-sixpence for cloth in the shoes, 
when they are in decent trim. Blucher's brings two shillings 
and upwards, and Wellington's about the same. I have sold 
children's shoes as low as three-pence and as high as one and 
sixpence. I carry a wooden seat with me so that a man who 
wants to buy from me can sit down and try on a pair anywhere. 
People who havn't got any money to throw away generally 
likes to get their second-hand boots or shoes as big as you have 
tl:em, cos wy, when they take them in the rain if they are a 
tight fit they can't put them on." 

On an average the one-eyed boot and shoe seller informed 
me that he made about four to seven shillings a week, and he 
called it a very good week when he managed to make ten shil- 
lings profit. 

Dog-sellers, of whom there are about two hundred in Lon- 
don, always choose the most public places for their stations. 

Down in Parliament street, opposite the Horse Guards, in 
Trafalgar square, at the base of Nelson's Monument, in Upper 
Recent street by the Coliseum, on the steps of the Bank and 
the'^Royal Exchange, on Waterloo Bridge and along the Thames 
Eml)ankment, and in fact wherever a large open space may be 
found, or a well known public building located, the dog-fancier 
may be noticed with a poodle between his legs, a black and tan 
under one arm and a spaniel under the other, and by his side, 
it is more than probable that a basket will be placed full of 
live, kicking, and sagacious pups, of different colors and of as 
many breeds. 

These doo'-sellers arc the keenest street traders to be found 
in London, and dramatists and playwrights are never weary of 
making sketches and amusing characters of dog fanciers. 



396 STREET SIGHTS OF LONDON. 

Some years ago, two rascals, bearing tlie names of "Ginger" 
and " Carrots," made themselves famous for the number of 
dogs stolen by them. At last it was impossible for any canine 
to escape these fellows, and so industrious did they become in 
the pursuit of them that they were arrested by tlie police and 
sent to the House of Correction for six months, wliich is the 
penalty for stealing one dog, yet "Ginger" and "Carrots" 
had, in their career, stolen thousands of unsuspecting yelpers 
from their owners. 

In one year GO dogs were reported lost, 606 stolen, 38 per- 
sons were charged with dog stealing, 18 of whom were con- 
victed, and 20 discharged. 

It is a fact worth noting, that, excepting in rare cases, the 
dog stealers do not affiliate with or frequent the com})any of 
house-breakers, or thieves of any other class. Dog stealing 
among professionals is looked upon as a noble science, and de- 
serving of long and arduous practice. 

On wet days, when pedestrians may be forced by the sud- 
denness of the rain gusts to seek refuge in some arcade or 
collonadc,like those in Piccadilly or the Regents' Quadrant, it 
is then that the dog fancier suddenly emerges from his hiber- 
nation, and knowing tliat he will have the attention of a group 
of people who are without occupation while in shelter, he may 
be certain to dispose of his dogs to advantage. It is upon old 
and timid ladies that these dog venders are sure to practice 
their tricks. 

Let an old maid but look longingly at some hairy poodle or 
woolly King Charles, — then woe be to her if she attempt to es- 
cape without buying. 

" Wot," said one heartless villain of a dog fancier to a spin- 
ster wearing gold spectacles, who was trying to make her es- 
cape from his alarming language, as he stood in the Strand 
with a pet poodle in his arms, " does ye keep me 'ere a torkin 
for three blessed hours and then ye goes hoff without buying 
this beutifool dorg as is dirt cheap at twenty pounds and I hoffers 
it to ye for five sovs. I say, do take it with ye and make a 
muff of hit, the precious dear. All ye have to do is to get its 



WHO KEEP BIRDS. 397 

legs and tail cut off, and get its insidcs scooped out, and ye'll 
have a splendid muff. Wot, ye won't buy, hey? Pir-leece, 
Pir-leece," and tlie fellow began to scream for the police as if 
the poor frightened old maid had intended to rob him. 

Bird-Sellers frequent tlie New Cut, Lambeth, Bermondsey, 
Whitechapel, Billingsgate, and Smithfield, as well as the dif- 
ferent streets of Southwark and Blackfriars. 

There are hundreds of these bird-sellers to be found hawk- 
ing tlieir birds all over the city. They are shrewd, speculative 
men, and can tell a bird's age and power of singing almost at 
a glance. 

The smallest cage costs sixpence, and a tlu'ush and cage 
of a common kind is valued at 2s. Gd. A canary that sings 
well may fetch about 3s. The hens or female birds do not have 
a large sale, and the trade in pigeons is decreasing, OAving to 
the emigration of many of the Spitalfield weavers, who had a 
great love for pigeons and were the principal breeders of that 
bird in England. 

Tlie poorer the family, the more likely that a bird will be 
found in the house ; and stable boys, laborers, and the humbler 
class of artisans, are in the habit of keeping birds in their 
dwellings. 

It is also curious to notice the love formed by women who 
lead an abandoned life, for all kinds of birds, chiefly, however, 
for those that will sing. I noticed, in making a tour of inspec- 
tion with the police among the Slums of the Haymarket, that 
nearly every woman of foreign extraction and of dissolute life 
had a linnet, canary, or blackbird, in her room. Frenchwomen 
of tliis class are very fond of canaries. Poor, lonely, forsaken 
wretches, it is the instinct of deprived maternity which de- 
mands that they should have something to love and make a 
pet of. 

Sailors, who Imve returned from long voyages, will stop in 
the street when they see a bird-seller's stand, look at it for a 
moment with open mouth, and taking out a handful of silver, will 
give the bird-fancier any price he chooses to ask for a sweet 
singing bird. The bird will serve as a gift to some female 



398 STREET SIGHTS OF LONDOX. 

relative, a wife, or as, in many cases, some woman of the town 
■will receive the cage and its occupant as a gift from the drunk- 
en Jack-Tar. 

About five thousand parrots arc imported and sold annually 
in London. They are chiefly brouglit from Africa, and a fine 
parrot will bring as high as a pound. Quite a number of these 
birds die on the liomcward voyage, and this makes tlie price 
of parrots very higli. Birds' nests are also sold in the streets 
by Italian and Savoyard boys in great numbers. 

Squirrels, rabbits, and gold and silver fish may l)e also found 
for sale in the streets, the latter being bought to keep in glass 
globes as ornaments. 

At every railroad station, in and outside of London, a per- 
son can be weighed for a penny. A man named Read has at 
least one hundred weighing chairs, which he rents out to men 
and boys at a certain rate of the gross receipts. On the dif- 
ferent bridges cripples and retired soldiers may be found with 
brass instruments for testing the lungs and power of a man's 
arms, and also machines are to be found in front of well-known 
public houses, and in the parks and squares, for measuring the 
height of pedestrians. 

There was one old fellow with whom I became acquainted, 
who kept a measuring and a weighing machine. 

His station was on the Middlesex side of the Waterloo 
Bridge. He told me that he had been a pot-boy in a cheap 
eating house for five years, and then was a heli)er in a gentle- 
man's stable for six years. One of his arms was rendered 
useless from an attack of paralysis, and finding that he could 
not any longer work as a helper, he borrowed enough money 
to purchase the weighing and measuring machines. 

Having some curiosity to know the average weight and height 
of his many customers, I made a bargain with him, as he could 
read and write, to keep a record of his experience for three 
days of the physique of those who patronized his machines. 

His patrons were chiefly laboring men on the new Thames 
Embankment, boatmen plying on the river, clerks going and 
coming to their business over Waterloo Bridge, and soldiers. 



COKE SELLERS. 



390 



His largest income was on Saturday niglits, when the labor- 
ing people were flush of copjxir pennies, and as nearly every 
third man was sure to he drunk going over the bridge on Satur- 
day night, he was certain to reap a good harvest from their 
generous pockets. 

In three days he had weighed one hundred and thirty-two 
persons of the male sex, and eight women. The average 
wciglit of each person I found Avas, including the women, one 
hundred and fifty-five pounds. The number of persons meas- 
ured for their height was sixty -four, and the average tallness of 
each person, among which number was only one female, was 
five feet eight inches. The soldiers were of course the tallest. 
These figures speak 
well for the London 
Cockneys. One of the 
women, a cook, meas- 
ured six feet, and 
weighed one hundred 
and ninety-eight lbs. 
I gave the venerable 
statistician a shilling 
and bade him good- 
bye, but not before I 
had received liis bless- 
ing in fervent tones. 

The consumption 
of coke purchased 
from the various gas 
houses of the city by 
jxiddlers and hawkers 
is enormous. 

There are about 
two thousand j^ersons concerned in this street trade, one hund- 
red of whom are women, and the aggregate includes boys. 
The various gas companies realize a yearly sum equal to six 
million of dollars from the sale of the coke. The peddlers 
distribute the coke to their customers in large vans, wheel- 




COKE PEDDLER. 



400 STREET SIGHTS OF LONDON. 

barrows, donkey carts, hand carts, and some of these strong 
limbed, broad chested fellows, carry the coke from door to 
door in large sacks. A few of the women own routes, and 
hire boys or men to sell the coke, giving them eight to twelve 
shillings a week, according to their merits and enterprise as 
hawkers. Coke is bought by tlicse hawkers at the gas liouses 
at from three to four pence per bushel, and is sold by them 
again at eight pence per bushel. 

In giving the rates which I will have occasion to quote from 
time to time in this work, I shall generally give the prices in 
British money. 

Salt is also vended in carts and wheel-barrows like coke, 
and some of the peddlers of that much desired article for 
seasoning and preserving food, sell in one day as much as five 
hundred pounds. The wholesale price to the hawkers is about 
2s. 6d. per hundred pounds, and it is sold by them to the poor 
people in thickly populated districts, at a penny a pound, or 
sometimes cheaper. 

Sand is sold in large quantities to the keepers of publics and 
small shops, and to those keeping stalls in the old markets, at 
twenty shillings a load, and the sand peddlers pay a license of 
two pounds per annum. In fact all the London peddlers pay a 
tax or license of some kind or another. 

One of the strangest sights in London is the "Bum Boat" 
of a " Purl," or warm beer seller, who may be found now and 
then of a dark foggy day plying his vocation on the Thames. 

Formerly there were hundreds of these beer peddlers upon 
the river, but I believe that there are but a few, perhaps not 
more than five or six, who still follow this occupation. 

One day while pulling around the shipping below London 
bridge in a small boat, I came across one of the "Bum Boat" 
men, who might, I believe, be taken as a very fair specimen 
of his class, or calling, once numerous, but now only a scattered 
remnant of their former numbers. 

This fellow, a sun-browned-looking man of thirty years of 
age or thereabout, was impelling a craft, a strongly constructed, 
broad bottomed barge or yawl, in and out among the smoky 



STOCK IN TRADE 



401 



looking coal barges, fish and oyster craft and coasting steamers. 
He wore a dark blue guernsey shirt and a yellow oil-skin jacket, 
with heavy water boots which encased his large legs from the 
knees downward. An immense "Sou'-westcr" shaded his 
broad face, and he was trying to drive the fog away by smoking 
a dreadful black clay pipe. 

At the stern of the boat was a rough canvas awning, and 
under this the " Purl" man told me that he slept for weeks and 
months, while his boat lay at anchorage in some of the nooks 
of the busy river. 




BUM BOAT MAN. 

He seldom or ever went ashore, excepting when necessity 
compelled him to debark for the purpose of laying in beer and 
other stock for his customers. 

In the bottom of the boat were heaps of fresh onions, a bag 

of potatoes, a couple of bushels of Swedisli turnips, parsnips, 

carrots, some packages of tea and coffee in small square brown 

parcels, tied with white string, a tin box full of nmtton 

25 . 



402 STREET SIGHTS OF LONDON. 

chops and beef steaks, cut ready for sale, and other articles of 
food that would be most relished by seafaring men on their 
return from a voyage. 

There were also in the boat a small patent sheet-iron fur- 
nace, two little casks of beer, each containing about four gal- 
lons of tliat beverage, a can witli a gallon of gin of tlie cheap 
and fiery brand, and two tin pannikins in which he warmed the 
beer, or " Purl," as it is called, upon the small slieet-iron stove. 
This he sold hot to the sailors, oystermen, and coal bargees, 
at four pence a pint. It was most wonderful to see the dex- 
terous manner in which this Bum Boat man passed in and out 
between the numerous craft, paddling and ringing a hand bell 
the while, witliout any collision or trouble, and then to hear 
through the fog, the answering cries from the sailors who 
recognized his welcome bell ; 

" Boat ahoy !" 

"Bellah-o-o-y!" 

"P-i-n-t o' P-u-r-1 a-h-o-o y !'* 

Tlien for an instant the bell would cease, and the dark shapes 
of the "Bum Boat" and its proprietor would be seen, as the 
latter stood up to reach a noggin of gin to a bargee, or a pewter 
pint of foaming hot "Purl" to some thirsty soul of a tar just 
arrived from Greenwich, Glasgow, or Cork. 

The "Bum Boat" man is one of the most picturesque sights 
of that most picturesque of cities, London. The few who still 
ply their avocation on the river, are in pretty comfortable cir- 
cumstances, and their lives are as happy as can be imagined, 
much more so, I have no doubt, than they were when there 
were hundreds of them paddling about the river and impover- 
ishing themselves by a ruinous comi>etition. 

I have often noticed miserable, wan, and half naked looking 
little children, in and around the Regent's Circus, and in tlie 
neigliborhood of the Cafds and Pall ]\Iall, with small bags 
made from the material used in potato sacks, collecting cigar 
ends and crusts of bread from ash heaps and dust bins. Won- 
dering what use could be made of these disgusting fragments, 
I one day accosted a lad of twelve years or thereabouts, who 



HOW DICK GETS HIS PORRIDGE. 



403 



was busily engaged in searcliing a dust bin near Simpson's 
Tavern in the Strand, which is a resort for fashionable dinere 
out. 

I said to him, after giving him a penny, which will always 
unclose the lips of the sauciest London street boy : 

" Child, why do you collect these fragments of crusts and 
cigar ends ?" 

" Mister," said the half frightened child, who took me at the 
first glance for a detective in plain clothes — and by the way, 
it seems as if every poorly clad and hungry man and woman in 
London were suspicious of the police, for the reason that they 
are poorly clad, and for that reason alone — 

" Mister," said the hun- 
gry child, whose face was 
prematurely aged, "I aint 
doing nothink ; I was only 
grabbing the crusts for 
porridge." 

"For porridge, — how 
do you make the por- 
ridge, my lad?" 

"My mother — she is 
down in Milbank street, 
and has got the small 
pox, but before she was 
sick she used to bile the 
crusts in hot water and 
put a pcnnorth o' oat 
meal in the pot. She 
borrowed the pot from 
Mre. Clarke, she did." 

" Who makes the porridge now, boy," said I to him. 

" A gal — me big sister Mag — she makes ladies' shoes for a 
shop, and wacks me when she's mad and I aint got no money 
for gin. I likes porridge, and Mag she makes it so prcshis 'ot. 
My name's Dick." 




"l GETS IT FOR CIGAU STtMfS." 



404 • STREET SIGHTS OF LONDOX. 



1 



" Well, Dick, how do you get the ' pennorth' of oat meal for 
the porridge?" 

" I gets it for cigar stumps. I finds a lot on 'em and sells 
'em, and I gets ten browns for a pound on 'em. The tibbaccy 
man buys 'em, but he wont buy the short ones, cause he says 
they are all wet and the tibbaccy is all gone from them. I 
makes tuppence a day sometimes." 

There are, I am told, fifty or sixty persons, men and boys, 
some of whom are Irish, engaged in this branch of the Street 
Finders' vocation. 

It would be tedious to give an account of all the different 
branches of street selling and buying in London. Their num- 
ber is legion, and it would be the work of weeks to merely reca- 
pitulate all the strange ways and means whereby wretchedness 
exists in the heart of surrounding splendor, and what would 
seem to be, but is not — an all-pervading charity. 

But I cannot close tliis chapter without glancing at the 
street performers— street " Peep" Shows, Reciters, Showmen, 
Strong Men, Dancing boys and men, Tom Tom players, 
Street Clowns and Acrobats, Bagpipe players, Negro Serena- 
ders. Street Bands, Punch and Judy shows, and other street 
folk, who are almost if not as numerous as the hawkers and 
■ collectors. 

There is to be seen on Saturday nights, in the vicinity of 
Farringdon and the old London markets, now and tlien a stray 
Peep Show man, who frequents the most crowded districts, 
where the poorer people have money to spend. These Peep 
Shows are conveyed through the streets on a low four wheeled 
wagon, sometimes by the performer or proprietor in person, at 
other times by a donkey. Donkeys cost from two to five 
pounds in London, according to their breed and tractability. 

On the wagon a square box is generally placed, having a 
large glass front, which is covered with green baize or a dirty 
velvet curtain. 

This screen conceals the automaton figures that are set in 
motion by the man in charge. Sometimes there is a hurdy 
gurdy, or hand organ, attached, and while the exhibitor turns 



STREET ACROBATS. 



405 



a crank to allow the spectators to look at the revolving pictures 
of tlie " Capture of the Malakoff," the " Death of Nelson," 
" Napoleon at Waterloo," or some other historic picture, the 
hurdjgurdj will plaj " Old Dog Tray," " The Lancashire Lass," 
or some other popular ditty. Representations of the most hor- 
rible murders, or executions of well known criminals, are much 




6TBEET ACROBATS. 



relished by the London mobs, and are well patronized. One 
of these men told me that he was accustomed to take three and 
four shillings on Saturday nights in Farringdon market or the 



406 STREET SIGHTS OP LONDON. 

New Cut, while during the week he might not make four shil- 
lings altogether. 

Street acrol^ats, or posturcrs, are often met with in Lon- 
don. They are to be found usually in streets which have one 
end closed, or near the river. Thus the traffic is not impeded, 
owing to the absence of vehicles ; and a street like those which 
run off the Strand toward the river will be quiet as the grave 
all day long until near the dusk, when all at once, as if by 
magic, a curious crowd of men, women, and children will col- 
lect around a man and boy or boys, who will in the most busi- 
ness like fashion proceed to divest themselves of their outward 
clothing, which of course is of a rather shabby kind, and in a 
few moments they will appear in all tlie glory of flesh-colored 
tights, just as they may l)e seen standing in the sawdust of a 
circus arena. Their foreheads are glorious with silver tinsel 
or silk riblion fillets, their loins girt with strips of velvet, and 
their whole rig of a theatrical character. Some of the children 
are really handsome, and most exquisitely shaped, the results 
of athletic exercise and free fresh air. But the men, poor 
devils, have all of them a haggard, worn, fretful look, with 
hollowed cheek and straggling gray liair. 

Having placed a piece of cari)et, rather threadbare in appear- 
ance, in the middle of the street, after selecting the cleanest 
spot for it, these fellows (who are soon in the centre of a ring of 
people, from whom coppers are collected while the acrobats are 
bounding in air), go to work, and for half an hour will amaze, 
delight, edify, and instruct the grown children, larking street 
boys, and nursery maids of the neighborhood, and having col- 
lected perhaps ten pence or a shilling, they will gather up the 
carpet, don their soljcr, shabby garments, and find anotlier 
quarter to do their trapeze, pyramid, and dancing feats. 

Nearly all these street acrobats arc bruised, or are in some 
way injured, and many die young from falls. 

Occasionally they will disappear from the crowded London 
streets, in search of a scanty existence in some miserable 
provincial barn of a theatre or music hall, and years may 
perhaps elapse before their pinched cheeks and hungry eyes 



I 



PUNCH AND JUDY SHOW. 



407 



will again be encountered in the shabby chop houses and dark 
. Ifines of London. Six shillings a week is as much as these 
poor wanderers, soiled by the glare of tallow candles in crazy 
barns and slieds, can expect to make in the provincial towns 
and villages. Therefore London, with all its misery, is very 
dear to them, for with much less toil and labor they can realize 
twelve to fifteen shillings per Aveek in the Capital. 

But the great and lasting attraction among the multifarious 
street scenes of London, is the Punch and Judy show, the de- 
light of joyous children, of the rich and poor, whether in Bel- 
gravia or St. Giles. And indeed, Punch and Judy shows reap 
more profit in a poor and squalid district than they will in the 
aristocratic quarters. 

It is rarely that the police will disturb these street shows, 
unless that house- 
holders should pre- 
fer a complaint that 
they were annoyed, 
and then of course 
they are driven 
away. I have myself 
looked and listened 
for many an hour to 
these absurdly hu- 
morous shows, to 
Punch and Judy, 
the Dog, the Clown, 
and some negro char- 
acters selected for 
the exhibition. Usu- 
ally there is a man, 
his wife, and a boy 
tocollectthe pennies 
thrown from win- 
dows or given by the crowd which assembles to witness the 
performance. 

The man plays the pipes, fastened at liis breast, and the 
drum with his elbow ; and the woman keeps the figures in mo- 




PUNCH AND JCDY. 



408 STREET SIGHTS OF LONDON. 

tion on the miniature stage, the hack of -wliicli is hidden by a 
green curtain or tent, ])laced in the cart. Behind this screen 
the woman conceals herself and talks for the little automaton 
figures. There is a set dialogue in which the figures are sup- 
posed to converse, and as it is seldom changed, I give the fol- 
lowing portion of a comedy of conversation, as that chiefly used 
for many years by the London Punch and Judy shows : 

Enter Judy. 

Punch. What a sweet creature ! what a handsome nose and 
chin ! (He pats Judy on the face lovingly.) 

Judy. Keep quiet, do ! (Slapping him wickedly.) 

Punch. Don't be cross, my ducky, but give me a kiss. 

Judy. Oh, to be sure, my love. (They embrace and kiss.) 

Punch. Bless your sweet lips. (Hugging her.) These are 
melting moments. I'm very fond of my wife, I must have a 
dance. 

Judy. Agi'eed. (Dancing.) 

Punch. Get out of the way, you don't dance well enough 
for me. (Hits her on the nose.) Go and fetch the baby, and 
mind and take care of it and not hurt it. (Judy goes off.) 

Judy. (Coming back with the baby.) 
Take care of the baby while I go and cook the dumplings. 
Punch. (Striking Judy with his hand.) Get out of the 
way! I'll take care of the baby (and Judy goes out). 
Punch. (Sits down and sings to the baby.) 

" Hush a-bye baby on the tree top, 
AMien the wind blows the cradle will rook; 
When the bough breaks the cradle will fall, 
Down comes the baby, cradle and all." 

(The baby cries and Punch throws it up and down violently.) 
Punch. What a cross child ! I can't abear cross children. 

(Shakes the baby and pretends that he is about to kill it, and 

finally throws it out of the window.) 

Enter Judy. 
Judy. Where is the baby? 



PUNCH IS EXECUTED. 409 

Punch. (In a lemoncholy tone.) I have had a misfortune ; 
tlie child was so terrible cross I throwed it out of the window, 
I did. (Lamentation of Judy for her dear child. She goes 
into asterisks, and then excites and fetches a cudgel, and com- 
mences beating Punch over the head.) 

Punch. Don't be cross, my dear, I didn't go to do it. 

Judy. I'll pay ycr for a throwin' the child out of the win- 
der. (She keeps a beatin him on the blessed head with the 
stick, but Punch snatches the stick away, and commences a 
smashin of her blessed head.) 

Judy. (Screaming like hanythink.) I'll go to the Consta- 
ble and have you locked up. 

Punch. Go to the devil. I don't care where you go. Get 
out of the way. (Judy goes hoff, and Punch sings, " Par Ex- 
cellence," or, "Ten Little Indians." N. B. All before is senti- 
mental, but this here's comic. Punch goes through his roo- 
too-to-roocy, and in comes the Beadle hall in red.) 

Then the "Clown" and "Jim Crow," the "Doctor," "Jack 
Ketch," the hangman, with various characters, follow each other 
in quick succession and enact their absurdities to the intense 
delight of the "juveniles," as the showman, in his printed 
book of the play calls the children. Punch is tried and con- 
victed of murder, and being sentenced to death, is finally hung 
by Jack Ketch, at Newgate, as a punishment for his crimes, 
and is then placed in a coffin and given to be dissected. 

All through these performances I have frequently noticed that 
the child spectators sympathized with Punch, — who is certainly 
a most notorious criminal if we are to judge by his actions on 
the stage of the Punch and Judy show, — and they always ai> 
plauded when the Beadle got the worst of the fight. 

It is a strange instinct, that which rises and glows in the breast 
of a child, — this resistance to the spirit or personification of 
authority. 

The same instinct in the full-grown man, draws a mob of 
ragged blouses after a Rochefort, in the streets of Paris, and 
builds barricades from which they fire upon the hireling sol- 
diery of a Bonaparte. 




CHAPTER XXVII. 

THE BRITISH MUSEUM AND NATIONAL GALLERY. 

N Great Russell street, Bloomsbury square, is 
the British Museum, one of the chief glories of 
the English metropolis, and an institution of 
which every Londoner is deservedly proud. 
There is, perhaps, no finer collection of curiosities and 
antiquities, and the nation has been for a century 
gathering the tributes of Science, Art, and Antiquity 
together in this vast building, which covers, with 
grounds and outbuildings, an area of seven acres. 
The first purchase for the collection was made in 1750, when 
Sir Hans Sloane, a great collector and scientific man, died, 
leaving a will, in which he suggested that his collection which 
cost him £50,000 should be bought by Parliament for £20,000. 
This offer was accepted, and an act was passed purchasing Sir 
Hans Sloane's " library of books, drawings, manuscripts, prints, 
medals, seals, cameos, and intaglios, precious stones, agates, 
jaspers, vessels of agate, crystals, mathematical instruments, 
pictures, etc." Thus was laid thefirst foundation of the nowworld 
famous British Museum. By the same act a purchase was 
made of the Harleian Library of about 7,000 rare volumes of 
rolls, charters, and manuscripts, to which were added the Cot- 
tonian Library, and the library of Major Arthur Edwards. A 
lottery was de%'ised, from which .£100,000 was realized, and 
the collections were paid for from this fund, as well as the sum 
of £10,250 which was paid to Lord Halifax 'for Montague 
House, in which the museum was then located, and on which 



THE READING ROOM AND ITS OCCUPANTS. 4ll 

site the present building has been erected. The additional 
sum of X 12,873 was paid for the repairs of Montague House, 
and a fund was also set apart for its taxes, salaries of officers, 
and Trustees, who were chosen from the best and noblest in 
the land, and in 1759 the Museum was opened to the public. 

The present lofty and imposing building was thirty years in 
construction, although the Museum was all that time open to 
the public, the building being erected piecemeal. The main 
buildings form a quadrangle with spacious and lofty galleries 
and courts. The entrances to the buildings are by magnificent 
staircases of stone, and the portico is adorned with giant figures 
and groups of sculpture. 

Even in the old Egyptian days, no greater masses of stone 
were ever used than those which have been placed in the grand 
flight of steps of the main facade. There are twelve stone steps, 
120 feet in width, terminating with pedestals, on which are 
the groups of sculpture. There are 800 huge stones in the 
edifice, weighing from five to nine tons each. 

In the pediment, on the main front, are typified in storied 
stone, Man, Religion, Paganism, Music, the Drama, Poetry, 
the Patriarchs, Civilization, Science, Mathematics, and other 
allegorical figures. The entire buildings have cost upward of 
.£1,000,000. The principal doorway is really majestic, being 
twenty-four feet high and ten feet wide. 

The Reading-Room of the Library contains 1,250,000 cubic 
feet of space, the dome being 140 feet in diameter and 106 feet 
high. In this vast room an echo is heard like the sound of a 
trumpet, and on its shelves, and in contiguous alcoves, are 
800,000 volumes of books upon every known subject and in 
every known language. This room cost <£ 150,000. 4,200 
tons of iron were used in the construction of the dome alone. 
There is accommodation for 300 readers, each person having a 
desk and table In a space of four feet three inches. 

There is a great silence in this vast room where every one 
seems bent on study. The very door-keepers who take your 
hat and umbrella, have a studious look. Every visitor presents 



412 THE BRITISH MUSEUM AND NATIONAL GALLERY. 

his ticket of admission, and is registered for the benefit of 
the statistics of the Kingdom. Scores of men who have a 
taste for literature and reading, and no money to buy Ijooks, 
come liere, and, during lunch-hours, those who are anxious to 
study, and do not wish to leave their seats, may be seen taking 
from under their tables light luncheons, kidney-pies, and sand- 
wiches, of which they partake with that peculiar shamefaced- 
ness which is always observable in people who eat in public 
places. 

There is a member of Parliament in his natty suit, and with 
a heavy watch-chain, who has gotten him down an old rusty 
tome, from which he is cramming with great earnestness for 
the next debate. Last night he had never heard of the subject 
of which he is reading, and just now he is full of it, and 
so puzzled with the wealth of the material before him that he 
does not know at which end to begin. 

There is an old gentleman, in thread-bare clothes, and worn 
cuffs, who has a very mild and placid face, and blue bulbous 
eyes. The table before him is strewn with old, worn volumes, 
bound with parchment and sheei>skin covers, and every time 
he turns a leaf a cloud of powdered dust ascends to his nostrils, 
and he is nearly suffocated. It is easy to see from this man's soft 
and fixed look that he is a monomaniac upon some subject, and 
that he is now settled for the day. Ah ! what a sigh of relief 
from the old codger. He has, after great trouble, secured in 
his mind the point in dispute, and now he is at work rapidly 
scratching away at his notes. Looking over his shoulder I 
can see that the old fellow has a number of works on the sub- 
ject of Heraldry before him, and he is, of course, tracing some 
mystic pedigree to the Flood, or further back, perhaps for the 
satisfaction of a butcher or tailor who may be in want of an 
escutcheon and a bar sinister in his shield. 

Li 1827, Sir Joseph Banks presented his botanical collection, 
and 66,000 valuable volumes. In 1837, the Prints and Draw- 
ings, the Geology and Zoology departments were formed, and 
in 1857, the Department of Mineralogy. The Museum is di- 
vided into departments of Printed Books, Manuscripts, An- 



THE MAGNIFICENT LIBRARIES. 413 

tiquities, Art, Botany, Prints, and Drawings, Zoology, Paleon- 
tology, Mineralogy, and Sculpture, each under the charge of 
an "Under-Librarian." 

There are five Zoological galleries or saloons, embracing 
everything in the schedule of serpents, monkeys, lizards, 
tortoises, crocodiles, toads, antelopes, rhinoceri, elephants, 
and hippopotami, giraffes, buffaloes, oxen, lions, tigers, bears, 
otters, kangaroos, apes, squirrels, whales, sharks, porpoises, 
and all kinds of fish and moUusca. 

There is also a gallery of Fossils, Zoological and Geological, 
and a Gallery of Minerals. In these galleries are eight saloons. 
Then follow the Departments of Botany, and the Department of 
Antiquities, containing vases, terra cottas, bronzes, coins, and 
medals. There are also three saloons of Anglo-Roman An- 
tiquities, of Roman Iconography, three Greco-Roman saloons, 
the Greco-Roman Basement Room, the Lyceum Gallery, and the 
Elgin Rooms, in which are the splendid marbles collected by 
Lord Elgin at Athens, and which were bought for £35,000 by 
Parliament. 

There are also the Hellenic Galleries of Marbles, the second 
Elgin Room, the Assyrian Galleries, 300 feet in length, and 
thirty other galleries, and innumerable saloons crowded with 
the most wonderful and valuable objects of art and science. 

There is a Newspaper Saloon with the finest collection of 
newspapers in England. The catalogues of the libraries and 
collections of tlie Museum alone amount to 620 volumes. The 
collections are valued at X 15,000,000. By act of Parliament, 
a copy of every book, pamphlet, sheet of letter-press, sheet of 
music, chart, plan or map, issued in Queen Victoria's donnn- 
ions must be delivered to the British Museum. There are three 
libraries in the Museum: the King's Library, presented by 
George IV, consisting of 80,000 volumes ; the Greenville 
Library, 21,000 volumes ; and the General Library of 730,000 
volumes, and which is inferior only to those of Munich and 
Paris. 

Magna Charta, if not the original, a copy made when King 
John's seal was affixed to it, was acquired by the British Mu- 



414 THE BRITISH MUSEUM AND NATIONAL GALLERY. 

scum with the Cottonian Library. It was nearly destroyed in 
the fire of Westminster in 1731 ; the parchment is much shriv- 
eled and mutilated, and the seal is reduced to an almost shape- 
less massof Avax. The MS. was carefully lined and mounted; 
and in 1733 an excellent facsimile of it was published by John 
Pine, surrounded by inaccurate representations of the armorial 
ensigns of the twenty-five barons appointed as securities for 
the due performance of Magna Charta. 

An impression of this fac- simile, printed on vellum, with the 
arms carved and gilded, is placed opposite the Cottonian origi- 
nal of the Great Charter, which is now secured under glass. 
It is about two feet square, is written in Latin, and is quite il- 
legible. It is traditionally stated to have been bought for four- 
pence, by Sir Robert Cotton, of a tailor, who was about to cut 
up the parchment into measures ! But this anecdote, if true, 
may refer to another copy of the Charter preserved at the Brit- 
ish Museum, in a portfolio of royal and ecclesiastical instru- 
ments, marked Augustus II, art. 106 ; and the original Charter 
is believed to have been presented to Sir Robert Cotton by Sir 
Edward Dering, Lieut.-Governor of Dover Castle ; and to be 
that referred to in a letter dated May 10, 1630, extant in the 
Museum Library, in the volume of Correspondence, Julius C. 
ni. fol. 191. 

In the Museum, also, is the original Bull, in Latin, of Pope 
Innocent III, receiving the kingdoms of England and Ireland 
under his protection, and granting them in fee to King John 
and his successors, dated 1214, and reciting King John's char- 
ter of fealty to the Church of Rome, dated 1213. Also, the 
original Bull, in Latin, of Pope Leo X, conferring the title of 
Defender of the Faith upon Ileiuy VIII. 

The Reading Room is open every day, except on Sundays, 
on Ash Wednesdays, Good Fridays, Christmas-day, and on any 
Fast or Thanksgiving days ordered by authority ; except also 
between the 1st and 7th of May, the 1st and 7th of September, 
and the 1st and 7th of January, inclusive. The liours arc from 
9 till 7 during May, June, July, and August (except on Satur- 
days, at 5), and from 9 till 4 during the rest of the year. To 



ADMISSION TO THE MUSEUM. 415 

obtain admission, persons are to send their applications in 
writing, specifying their Christian and surnames, rank or pro- 
fession, and places of abode, to the principal Librarian ; or, in 
his absence, to the Secretary ; or, in his absence, to the senior 
Under-Librarian ; who will either immediately admit such per- 
sons, or lay their applications before the next meeting of the 
Trustees. 

Every person applying is to produce a recommendation satis- 
factory to a Trustee or an officer of the establishment. Appli- 
cations defective in this respect will not be attended to. Per- 
mission will in general be granted for six month.*, and at the 
expiration of this term fresh application is to be made for a 
renewal. The tickets given to readers are not transferable, 
and no person can be admitted without a ticket. Persons under 
eighteen years of age are not admissible. 

Tlie Reader having ascertained from tlie Catalogue the book 
he requires, transcribes literally into a printed form the press- 
mark, title of the work wanted, size, place, and date, and signs 
the same. Readers, before leaving the room, are to return the 
books or MSS. they have received to an attendant, and are to 
obtain the corresponding ticket, the reader being responsible 
for such books or MSS. so long as the ticket remains uncan- 
celed. Readers arc allowed to make one or more extracts 
from any printed book or MS. ; but no whole or greater part 
of a MS. is to be transcribed without a particular j ermission 
from tlic Trustees. The transcribers are not to lay tlie papers 
on which they write on any part of the book or MS. they are 
using, nor are any tracings allowed without special leave of the 
Trustees. No person is, on any pretence whatever, to write 
on any part of a printed book or MS. belonging to the Mu- 
seum. 

The persons whose recommendations are accepted are Peers 
of the Realm. Memljers of Parliament, Judges, Queen's Counsel, 
Masters in Chancery or any of the great law-officers of the 
Crown, any one of the forty-eight Trustees of tlie British Mu- 
seum, the Lord ^layor and Aldermen of London, rectors of 
parishes in the metropolis, principals or heads of colleges, emi- 



416 



THE BRITISH MUSEUM AND NATIONAL GALLERY. 



nent physicians and surgeons, and Royal Academicians, or any 
gentleman in superior position to an ordinary clerk in any of 
the public ofhccs. 

Some idea of the magnitude of this great Museum may he 
formed when I state that the clerical and literary force connect- 
ed with the institution is larger than that of any similar found- 
ation in Europe but one — the Imperial Library at Paris. 

There is first a Principal Librarian, a Secretary, fifteen 
keepers of departments, beside a little army of attendants, 
messengers, bookbinders, watchmen, and doorkeepers, num- 
bering over one hundred persons. Beside there are fifty or sixty 
persons of literary eminence and celebrity connected with the 
Museum, and employed to perfect the collection, to collate and 
arrange the books and to classify subjects. In this way alone 
the expenses of the establishment amount to X40,000 yearly. 

The average number of visitors to the Museum yearly is over 
one million, and tlie galleries are entirely free to the public. 

Next to the British Museum, 
the most frequented place in 
London is the National Gallery 
of Art, in Trafalgar Square^ 
facing Nelson's Monument. This 
lofty monument fills the eye of 
the spectator as it takes in the 
range of one of the finest squares 
in Europe. The column is a 
circular one, 145 feet high, and 
the figure of the great naval 
liero. Nelson, on the top, is 17 
feet high. The monument was 
built in 1840-43, and is placed 
^ on an elevated pedestal of gran- 
ite. The Emperor Nicholas of 
Russia gave X500 toward the 
erection of the monument, and 

nelson's MOKUMENT. , , . •11 IV 1 

the rest was raised by pubhc sub- 
scription. The two immense lions of bronze who lie couchant 




m^ 



THE NATIONAL GALLERY. 417 

at the base of the monument, were modeled in iron from visits 
made by Sir Edwin Landscer to tlie live lions at the Zoological 
Gardens. 

There are also statues of Sir Henry Ilavelock and of Sir 
Charles Napier, on each side of the inclosure which fronts 
the Nelson column, twelve feet high and of bronze, and just 
below in an angle of the square is a bronze statue of George 
IV, which cost .£10,000. These three statues, which are all 
equestrian, were paid for by public subscription. 

On one side of the square is the church of St. Martin, an 
imposing looking building, built by Wren, and on tiie lofty 
steps of this church the crossing sweepers and bootblacks of 
the Metropolis have their daily rendezvous, and here divide 
their earnings with each other. 

Tlie National Gallery is, therefore, in a most commanding 
site, and from its broad steps a very fine view can be obtained 
of the Strand, Charing Cross, Parliament Street, and the 
Houses of Parliament. 

The edifice was finished in 1838, and is 461 feet in length, 
and its greatest width across the saloons of painting is 56 feet. 
The stones were taken to construct it entirely from the King's 
Stables or Mews, and the building has a peculiarly sombre and 
solid effect. In it are a range of spacious galleries, whose 
walls are covered with the greatest works of the old masters 
and modern painters. It is the chief collection of paintings 
in the British Islands, and the numljcr of subjects amount to 
1,600. The number of pictures in the National Gallery, as 
compared with the number in the Continental galleries, is as 
follows: National Gallery, 1,600; Dresden Gallery, 2,000; 
Madrid, 1,833; Louvre, 2,500 ; Vienna, 1,500; The Vatican, 
37 ; the Capitol, Rome, 250 ; Bologna, 280 ; Milan, 503 ; Turin, 
563 ; Venice, 688 ; Naples, 700 ; Frankfort, 380 ; Berlin, 1,350 ; 
Munich, 1,300; Florence, 1,200 ; Pitti Palace, 500; Amster- 
dam, 386 ; Hague, 304 ; Brussels, 400 ; and A'ersaillcs, 
4,000. 

The pictures in the National Gallery are divided into the 
Britisli and Foreign Schools. Of the British School there are 
26 



418 TIIK BRITISH MUSEUM AND NATIONAL GALLERY. 

795 paintings of various artists, and of various degrees of 
merit, in which the names of every English painter of conse- 
quence is inchidcd l)y his works. 

The chief collection in this division is that of Turner, the 
great colorist, and here are exhibited in a saloon by them- 
selves the finest specimens of that great painter's works, in all 
numbering over one hundred subjects, wliich, togetlier with 
a large collection of drawings and water colors, he bequeathed 
to the English people. 

Tlic Foreign School is sub-divided into the Italian, Spanish, 
Flemish, and French Schools, and these schools embrace 797 
fine pictures, in which the old masters chiefly predominate. Bj 
Three of Corregio's pictures in this gallery cost .£15,000, 
and tlie latest acquisition is a Michael Angelo valued at 
£30,000. 

The Gallery is open to the public on Mondays, Tuesdays, 
Wednesdays, and Saturdays ; and on Thursdays and Fridays 
to students only. It is open from Ten to Five from October 
until April 30, inclusive ; and from Ten to Six from April 
until the middle of September. It is wholly closed during the 
month of October. 

Daily this free gallery of art is thrown open to the working 
people who enjoy the paintings, excepting on the days specified. 
There is no charge whatever excepting for catalogaies of the 
British and Foreign Schools, which cost a shilling each. 

The question of opening the Galleries on Sunday lias been 
mucli agitated of late, but I question if the Britisli public, 
particularly the working or artisan class, care much for 
paintings. The lower classes of Englishmen are not, as a 
rule, very esthetical in their views or ideas, and I think the 
British masses are best calculated to shine at a cattle-show. 
There is nothing in this world so capable of striking an ave- 
rage Englishman's fancy as a Imge ox or a mountain of mov- 
ing beef. 

Corregio's master pieces. Turner's flaming colors, or Claude's 
landscapes do not move him at all ; but take him to a cattle- 
show, and behold he is all life and animation, and give him a 



WANT OF TASTE AMONG THE ENGLISH. 



419 



pot of beer in liis red fist, and he becomes positively witty, and 
capable of conversation. 

One tiling struck nic as I wandered hour after hour through 
these galleries, and that was the total lack of education in the 
commonest rudiments of art, and the complete ignorance mani- 
fested in the remarks of the boors who gave the greatest works 
of their countrymen but a passing glance, and walked on in 
stupid stolidity. At Versailles or Florence, there was life, en- 
thusiasm, and criticism of a very fair kind noticeable in the 
remarks of delight or disapproval which came from groups 
around a famous painting or a daub, but at the National Gal- 
lery the cattle-show and the pot of beer was still uppermost in 
all the looks and phrases of the spectators who used the place 
as a show room to pass an hour away. 







CHAPTER XXVIII. 

NAKED AND NEEDY. 



^j 




NE hundred and thirty years ago, infanticide and 
desertion of children, were twin crimes, very pre- 
valent among Englishwomen of the humbler and 
lower classes. The dull, twaddling, gossijMnong- 
ing newspapers of that day were often the vehicle 
through which the public ascertained that infants were found 
in dust-bins and dark alleys, and on dung-hills, there exposed by 
their miserable and heartless mothers to starvation and storm. 
Twenty or thirty children per week were exposed, in London, 
after this fashion, and the evil grew to such an extent that it 
served to awaken the benevolence of God-fearing men and 
women, and among those was one Capt. Coram, a sea-faring 
man who, by his long and repeated voyages and wanderings 
over many lands and in many strange waters, had accumulated 
a large sum of money. 

I fancy I can see that brave old fellow now in his closely 
buttoned-up tunic, his three-cornered mariner's hat set askew, 
his eyes beaming with kindness and compassion, picking his 
steps through the worst holes and quarters of Old London, the 
London of Queen Anne and of Bolingbroke, of conspiracies, 
of Hanoverian Successions, of Highwaymen and Newgate, and 
of all the faded memories of that olden time which enthrall 
sense and memory, when we try to recall that which we can 
only see as Macaulay saw it by the light of old newspaper scraps, 
chronicles, and by the memoirs and diaries, of the then insignifi- 
cant but to-day useful people, like Evelyn and Pepys. 

Who will not bless that noble old sailor, as I did, the May 



THE FATHER OF THE FOUNDLING. 



421 



evening I stood in the principal dormitory of tlie Foundling 
Hospital, in wliicli were comfortably housed over fifty of tlie 
devoted lambs, sleeping with warm clotlies covering their little 
bodies, and their infantile cliirpings seeming like a chorus of 
angels, whose visits are alas — few but far between. 




NUKSERY IN THE FOUNDLING HOSPITAL. 

There was the row of cots, and the kind-hearted women at- 
tending to their wants, and when I gave one of them an orange, 
the little twelve-pounder seemed as glad as if it had de- 
scended from the loins of a Tudor or a Stuart, instead of be- 
ing, as it was, both fatherless and motherless. 

I can see him who was to be father of the first Foundling 
Hospital in England, losing his way purjjosely, night after 
night, among those dark and badly lighted and unpaved streets 
and lanes that fringed the Thames River in those days, and 
from which issued nightly shouts of nuu-dcr and rapine, and 
the boisterous but less deadly revelry of bacchanalian seafaring 
men, in trunk liose and canvas tunics. I can see the link 



422 NAKED AND NEEDY. 



411 



boys with their smoky torches passing to and fro as in a fevered 
dream and the bearers of sedan chains, — tlie porters shouting at 
the brave-hearted grim seaman, who turns his kindly old eyes 
aside from the flashing glance of beauty shot at him in dumb 
wonder by the damsel on her way to Vauxhall, Ranelagh, or a 
Rout, and Captain Coram the meanwhile chatting and bestow- 
ing pennies upon the beggar's offspring or forsaken child. His 
heart was large as the seas which he had sailed over, and his 
happiest moment was when he had rescued from the gutters 
and death some poor foundling who had been thrown on the 
world to make its way. 

He had first embarked in the Newfoundland trade, and after 
some time spent in ploughing the Avaters between England and 
the Colonies, he set up at Taunton, Massachusetts, as a ship- 
wright, where he prospered apace. Then we find him, after some 
years, in Boston, where, by his enterprise, the manufacture of 
tar was established in the then infant Colonies. Home to Old 
England again after thirty years of wandering, and on landing 
at Cuxhavcn the brave old man was set upon by thieves and 
ruffians and plundered of all his earnings. Then the Govern- 
ment, in 1732, appoints him as a trustee for the settlement of 
Georgia, and subsequently he is engaged in the colonization of 
Nova Scotia. Finally he came home to project and carry out 
the idea of his life, which was the establishment of a Found- 
ling Hospital in London. 

Never was there a more indefatigable or tireless philanthrop- 
ist than this bluff old sailor. Insult, contumely, and humilia- 
tion he cheerfully underwent to carry out his cherished plan. 

One cold, stinging, December day, in the year 1737, Thomas 
Coram, — who had been advised that the Princess Amelia was a 
charitable and well disposed lady, and would be, perhaps, fa- 
vorable to an application for the scheme he had in view — start- 
ed for St. James' Palace, the then residence of royalty — with 
his three-cornered hat well planted upon his head, and his coat 
buttoned up, and offered a petition for the formation of a found- 
ling hospital through Lady Isabella Finch, the lady of the Bed 
Chamber in waiting, who turned upon Coram when he presented 



ADMISSION OF CHILDREN — HOW OBTAINED. 423 

her the paper, like a vixen, and bade him begone with cutting 
words and sneers. The poor okl fellow, with rage in his heart, 
strode from the doors of royalty and never troubled the Princess 
Amelia again. 

Fijially, George II became interested so far as to give a cliar- 
ter on the application of John, Duke of Bedford, the Master of 
the Rolls, the Chief Justice, the Chief Baron, the Speaker of the 
Commons, and the Solicitor and Attorney's General. Hogarth, 
who also became deeply interested in the charity, and ever 
afterward continued its benefactor, painted a shield for the 
Hospital, and on the 26th of October, 1740, tlie old house in 
Hatton Garden was thrown open to nameless and homeless 
children. 

The charter was signed by twenty-one ladies, of birth and 
distinction, and stated that " no exix;dient has been found out 
for preventing the frequent murders of poor infants at their 
birth, or of suppressing the custom of exposing them to perish 
in the streets, or putting them out to nurses, who, undertaking 
to bring them up for small sums, suffered them to starve, or, 
if permitted to live, either turned them out to beg or steal, or 
hired them out to persons by whom they were trained up in 
that way of living, and sometimes blinded or maimed, in order 
to move pity, and thereby become fitter instruments of gain to 
their employers. In order to redress this shameful grievance, 
the memorialists express their willingness to erect and support 
a hospital for all lielpless children as may be brought to it, ' in 
order that they may be made good servants, or, when qualified, 
be disposed of to the sea or land service of His Majesty the 
King.'" 

The children who are maintained by this charity are admit- 
ted on application of their mothers only, whose application to 
the governors must take place within twelve months of the 
birth of the child. 

The petition is read to the governors assembled in commit- 
tee ; and the petitioner is called in and examined as to lier 
allegations ; and then tlie steward of the hospital (with the pe- 
titioner's permission) is instructed to make secret inquiries as 
to the truth of the case. If tlic admission be ordered, it takes 



424 NAKED AND NEEDY. 

place on the Saturday fortnight after the order (a small weekly 
allowance behig made in the interim, if necessary, to the 
mother), when the child is examined l)y the apothecary, and if 
found perfect in eyes, limbs, and health, is received into the 
Institution. Its mother is presented with a certificate of its 
reception — with a certain letter on the margin, by which her 
infant pledge may be subsequently identified if necessary ; but 
in all probability she never sees the child again. 

It has a particular number assigned to it, which is sewn to 
its clothes, and becomes a property and chattel of the hospital. 
It is at once sent to the matron's room, and delivered to a wet- 
mu'se previously engaged ; and on the following day, being 
Sunday, it is baptised in the chapel of the institution — some 
common name, such as Smith or Jones, being given to it out 
of a list approved by the committee. On the same night, or 
following day, it is sent with its nurse into the country, who 
carries it to her own residence — she being generally the wife 
of some agricultural laborer — and reared there, under the 
occasional supervision of inspectors, for five years, when it 
returns to town for its education at the hospital. The number 
attached to its clothes remains so attached thoughout that time. 
At fourteen, the boys, at fifteen, the girls, arc apprenticed, 
but still looked after by inspectors from the hospital until they 
are twenty-one years of age, when they are supposed to be 
able to take care of themselves. Deserving adults, however, 
arc not lost sight of by the governors, and in case of incurable 
infirmities preventing apprenticeship, the Hospital does not de- 
sert its cliildren to the end. 

That the child be illegitimate is of course the most essential 
regulation, but an exception is made if the father be a soldier 
or sailor killed in the service of his country. Immediately 
after the battle of Waterloo, it was enacted that fifteen children 
of each sex should be forthwith admitted, the offspring of those 
who fell in that action ; but to the honor of the soldiers' wives, 
it is recorded that only two mothers gave way to the tempta- 
tion, and accepted the offer. No legitimate child has been ad- 
mitted into the hospital for tlic last ten years. 



A RUSH OF BABIES. 425 

The other conditions of admission are : that the petitioner 
shall not have applied for parish relief; that she shall have 
borne a good character previous to her misfortune ; and that 
the father shall have hond fide deserted his offspring, and be 
not forthcoming. The child acquires stronger claims for ad- 
mission, if, First : the petitioner has no relations able to main- 
tain the child; Second : if her shame is known to few persons 
(the express wish of the founder being that she might, if possi- 
ble, recover her lost position) ; and, Thirdly : that in the event 
of the child's being received, the petitioner has a prospect of 
obtaining an honest livelihood. 

The manner of admission was originally based upon that 
pursued " in France, Holland, and other Christian countries," 
as the wording of the quaint old charter went. The applicant 
came in at the outward door, rung the bell at the inward door, 
and presented her child ; no questions whatever were asked of 
her, nor did " any servant of the hospital i)resume to endeavor 
to discover who such person was, on pain of being dismissed." 
When the narrow limit of accommodation was reached, the 
notice, " The house is full," was affixed over the door. 

In October, 1745, the western wing of the present building 
was opened ; but so many more children were brought than the 
place could hold, that there were frequently a hundred women 
witli children at the door, when only twenty could be admitted. 
The ballot was then resorted to : all the women were admitted 
into the court-room, and drew balls out of a bag ; but it was 
still stipulated that if any desired to be concealed, the bag 
might be carried to them, or the matron was empowered to 
draw for them. 

In 1754, the hospital authorities had six hundred children 
to support, the cost of which exceeded their income fourfold. 
They therefore appealed to Parliament, who voted them ten 
thousand pounds on the condition that all api)licants under 
twelve months old should be received. This wholesale scheme 
of charity, which was largely assisted by more public grants, 
only lasted for four years. On the very first general reception- 
day, 117 infants were taken in, and 1,800 before the half-year 



426 NAKED AND NEEDY. 

was out ; while in tlic ensuing year 3,727 were admitted. Tlie 
consequences arc described to be lamentable. Immorality was 
greatly encouraged by the unlimited facility for thus disposing 
of its fruits, and the children themselves — though " the Found- 
ling" had then branch establisliments in many country places — 
could not be supported in such vast numbers. 

Of the 15,000 children received in those fom- years, no less 
than 10,000 perished in their infancy. Parish officers, with 
local cunning, sent to the Foundling the legitimate children of 
paupers, in order to relieve their constituents ; parents brought 
their own children, when dying, in order that the liospital should 
pay for their interment ; and surgeons were even employed 
by parents to convey their children to this Alma ]\Iater, at so 
so much per head, like pigs, or other cattle. 

Parliament withdrew its grant fr(3m this formidable charity in 
1759, altliough it humanely provided for the maintenance of 
all whom its too lavish charity had already admitted, and the 
branch country hospitals were discontinued. There were at 
that time 6,000 children in the institution under five years 
of age, and it was not until 1769, that by a{)])renticing all who 
were fit to be placed out, their number was reduced below 1,000. 
At the present time the yearly admissions average 32, and the 
total numl)er maintained by the Hospital is 430. 

As years sped by the spirit of the institution changed with 
its succeeding governors, and children were received without 
any inquiry, with whom a hundred pounds were paid down. 

The Court Room of the Foundling Hospital has pro])ably 
witnessed as painful scenes as any chamber in Great Britain, 
and though mothers may abandon their illicit offspring to the 
tender mercies of a public company, they cannot do it without 
great pain, and many an after pang of agony. 

These scenes are renewed again when the children at five 
years of age are brought up to London from the places tliey have 
been farmed out like young goats, and they arc tlicn separated 
from their foster mothers. Even the foster fathers arc sometimes 
greatly affected by the parting, while the grief of their wives 
is most excessive ; and the children themselves so pine after 



AN AGED FOUNDLING. 



427 















1 "'^^ 


, 1 ^ 


nil 


-1 J " 






^- / > ^ 


-,-- 


.«'i!i 



their supposed parents that they arc humored by holidays and 
treats, for a day or two after their arrival, in order to mitigate 
the change. 

Though infants received into the hospital are never again 
seen by their parents, save in peculiar cases, a kind of inter- 
course with them is still permitted. Mothers are allowed to 
come every Monday and ask after their children's health, but 
are allowed no further information. On an average about 
eight women a week avail themselves of this privilege, and 
there are some who come regularly every fortnight. 

I was present in one 
of the rooms of the 
Foundling Hospital 
while a stout red faced 
matron was engaged 
in washing one ofi 
these dear little babes 
of misfortime, and it 
was indeed an affect- 
ing spectacle, to hear 
the little motherless 
waif cry and watch 
its infantile kickings 
and splurgings in the 
wash tub. 

Even when applica- 
tion is made by moth- 
ers for the return of 
their child, it is fre- 
quently refused; 

when it is apprenticed, and no intercourse is permitted between 
them, unless master and mistress, as well as parent and child, 
approve of it ; nor when it has attained maturity, unless the 
child as well as the mother demand it. 

Thus a woman, who was married from the hospital, and had 
borne seven children, once requested to know lier parents, on 
the ground that " there was money belonging to her," and her 




WASHING THE WAIF. 



428 NAKED AND NEEDY. 

application was refused. But in November of tlie same year 
the name of a certain Foundling was revealed upon the appli- 
cation of a solicitor, and his setting forth that money had been 
invested for its use by tlie dead mother ; the governors grant- 
ing this request upon tlie ground that the motlier herself had 
disclosed the secret, which they were otherwise liound to keep 
inviolable. xVgain, in 1833, a Foundling, seventy-six years of 
age, was permitted, for certain good reasons, to become ac- 
quainted with his own name, though, as one may imagine, not 
Avith his parent. It is a wise child in the Foundling who even 
knows its own mother. 

Sometimes notes arc found attached to the infant's garments, 
beseeching the^Jli^^e to tell the mother her name and resi- 
dence, that the latter may visit lier child during its stay in the 
country ; and they have been even known to follow the van on 
foot which conveys their little one to its new home. Tliey will 
also attend the baptism in the chapel, in the hope of hearing 
the name conferred upon the infant ; for, if they succeed in 
identifying the child during its stay at nurse, they can always 
preserve the identification during its subsequent abode in the 
hospital, since the children appear in chapel twice on Sunday, 
and dine in public on that day, which gives opportunities of 
seeing them from time to time, and preserving the recollection 
of their features. 

In these attempts at discovery, mistakes, however, are often 
committed, and attention lavished on the wrong child ; instan- 
ces have even occurred of mothers coming in mourning attire 
to the hospital to return thanks for the kindness bestowed upon 
their deceased offspring, only to be informed that they are alive 
and well. 

It is stated that children who are discovered by the mother 
are spoiled by indulgence — and I can imagine that efforts to 
make u]) for the past would be lavish enough in such cases — 
and rarely turn out well. 

One exception to the rule of non-intercourse is related, where 
a medical attendant certified that the sanity of one unhappy 



HOW THEY DINE. 429 

woman might be affected unless she was allowed to see her 
child. 

Twice or thrice in the year the boys are permitted to take 
an excursion to Primrose Hill ; but at other times (except 
when sent on errands), and the girls at all times — arc kept 
within the hospital walls. This confinement so affects their 
growth, that few of either sex attain to the average height of 
men and women. 

It is a curious old place, this hospital for Foundlings, and full 
of memories. Here are some of Hogarth's best efforts as a 
}X)rtrait painter, and it was for this hospital that Handel Avrote 
his glorious oratorio of the " Messiah." The organ, so magnifi- 
cent in tone, which is placed in the chapel, was also the gift 
of Handel. 

The high old-fashioned reading desk, from whence the chap- 
lain expounds the scriptures ; the side galleries in the style of 
George I, and tlie pillars that seem to tell of the days of Ad- 
dison and Sterne and Swift, and all the rest of that galaxy who 
made the Augustan age of England — the rows of high 
backed benches such as are to be met with in all the London 
churches, built after the architectural period of Wren and Inigo 
Jones — combined with the low full toned voices of the 
boys and girls, as they raise the Anthem, seem to make the 
place a haven of rest and an abode of happiness for the poor 
world outcasts. 

Then there is the girls' dining-room, hung with some fine 
paintings and works of art. The girls enter and take tlieir 
stand, each in her proper place, against the long row of tables 
that extends from end to end of the room, the crowds forming 
a lane on either side. 

A moment's pause, and a sweet voice is heard saying grace : 
the utterer being that modest looking girl at the centre of the 
table, who from her superior lieight and appearance seems 
chosen as one of the oldest among her companions. Scarcely 
has she finished before another girl, at the end of the table, 
dispenses with the ease and rapidity of habit, from the large 
dishes of baked meat and vegetables before her, the dinners 



430 NAKED AND NEEDY. 

of the exjxjctant cliildrcn, plate following plate with marvelous 
rapidity, till all are satisfied. 

This room occupies a great portion of one side of the 
edifice. 

In the boys' room the evolutions of the lads preparatory to 
taking dinner are most interesting. The change at once, and 
without blunder, hesitation, or want of concert, from a two 
deep to a three deep line, then they beat time, march, turn and 
turn again, until the welcome word is given for the final march 
to the dinner table. Thousands of the citizens of London 
visit this hospital yearly, and ladies are particularly interested 
in all that pertains to its welfare. 

It has been enriched by inimmerable bequests, and has a 
revenue of over X 120,000 a year from rents, stock, and other 
sources. 

The charities of London are incalculable in their extent, and 
it is my belief that no other city in the world — excepting 
Paris — possesses so many and such various institutions where 
the sick, naked, and needy are taken in and cared for. And 
yet with all this benevolence, there is a pharisaical spirit of 
ostentation at the bottom of every pound that is given, and the 
pupils of the beneficed schools, the inmates of the almshouses, 
the patients in the various hospitals, and the vagrants and lost 
ones in reformatories, refuges, and model lodging houses are 
drilled, uniformed, preached at, exhibited to the public, and 
ventilated in the newspapers, while the donations of those who 
have established the charities are be-puffed and be-lauded until 
the stranger is astonished at the mountains of cant which 
smother the work of so many generously benevolent people. 

However, there is a vast amount of charity in London, and 
incalculable good is done those who are in need of it. 

I can only give the aggregate of all these charities, hospitals 
and almshouses, as I have not space for details. 

The incomes and receipts of the various Metropolitan Chari- 
table Institutions amount to about twelve millions of dollars 
annually, nmch of which is contributed voluntarily, and this vast 
sum does not include contributions to police courts for the use 



INCOME OF CHARITABLE INSTITUTIONS. 



431 



of prisoners, amounting to ^£50,000 a year, or the erection 
and endowment of schools, and other similar gifts bj individ- 
uals, — deeds which are impossible to classify, from their isola- 
tion. Besides the regular incomes, as below, the proceeds of 
former legacies amounts to X841,373, or nearly six million dol- 
lars of United States money. 

This large amount of nearly eighteen millions of dollars, 
double the entire sum realized from poor rates obtained in 
London, is divided among 640 institutions, of which 144 have 
been founded during the last ten years, 279 during the first 
half of the century, 114 during the Eighteenth Century, and 
103 before that period. 

The classification — generally speaking — and aggregate in- 
comes are as follows : 



INSTITUTIONS 



ANNUAL INCOUE. 



14 General Hospitals, ------ £174,858 

66 Hospitals and Institutions for Special Medical purposes, 155,025 

39 Dispensaries, ----.. 23,877 

12 Institutions for the Preservation of Life, Health, and Morals, 46,230 
1 Foundling Hospital, ------ 20,200 

22 Hospitals, Penitentiaries, and 16 Reformatories — total, - 93,981 

29 Relief Institutions, - - - - - - 64,720 

21 Homes, for both sexes, and all ages, - _ , 18,200 

9 Benevolent Pension Funds, .-•.-- 26,000 

20 Poor Clergymen's Benefit Funds, - - - 49,508 

72 Professional and Trade Benevolent Funds, - - - 125,051 

24 City Company and Parochial Trust Funds, - - 40,820 

4 Special National Funds, - - - . - 53,000 

124 Colleges, Almshouses, and Asylums, for the Aged, - 103,063 

1 Cripple's Charity, -----_ 7,215 

16 Deaf and Dumb Institutions, . - _ _ 43,521 

35 General Educational Funds, - _ . _ 112,600 

16 Asylums, educating 2,400 orphans, - . _ 80,634 

24 Educational Asylums for 3,700 children, - - - 120,000 

60 Home Missionary Societies, - - - . 413,171 

30 Foreign Missionary Societies, - - . - 642,217 
19 Jewish Charities, Hospitals, Schools, Almshouses, and Refuges, 163,000 

13 Grammar Schools, oi> original Foundations, - - 862,000 
12 Educational Establishments,— 8 parochial schools, libraries, 

lectures, and miscellaneous societies, of a charitable or be- 
nevolent character, ------ 732,000 



432 NAKED AND NEEDY. 

Some of these hospitals are not equaled by any in the world 
excepting those of Paris, and have splendid beds and the best 
of medical Staffs. 

Guy's Hospital is called after a London Alderman and Mem- 
ber of Parliament, who made a fortune, in Oliver Cromwell's 
time, selling Bibles, buying sailors' pawn-tickets, and in the South 
Sea Speculation Bubble. It has 22 wards and 600 beds, and 
averages, yearly, 6,000 in-door and 55,000 out>door beds, with 
24 professors and 250 students. The legacies left to this hos- 
pital amount to £500,000, and its annual income is over £30,- 
000. Kings' College Hospital has 180 beds, and about 2,000 
in-door and 40,000 out-door patients, annually. Its income 
is about £5,000 a year. The London Hospital has 500 beds. 

Bartholomew's Hospital, founded by a Catholic monk, in the 
hoary past, is the oldest and largest hospital in London, as its 
students are the wildest and most reckless in the metropolis. 
The number of in-door patients is 7,000; out-door, 100,000, 
annually, and the yearly income is £32,000. There are 700 
beds, 36 professors, and 500 students. 

The St. Thomas' Hospitals, now in process of construction 
at the Surrey Side of the Thames, in Lambeth, opposite the 
Houses of Parliament, will combine a number of hospitals for 
Special Diseases, and will accommodate about 2,000 patients, 
with as many beds, and will have an income of £50,000 a year, 
or more. 

It is impossible to think of any disease, complaint, deformity, 
or injury to any member or organ of the body, which has not 
its special hospital or institution for relief or cure, in the Eng- 
lish metropolis. There are homes for distressed widows, for 
Asiatics, Africans, and South Sea Islanders, a Benevolent So- 
ciety of Female Musicians, pne for the Prevention of Cruelty to 
Animals, a Life-Boat Society, Homes for Teaching the Blind to 
read, for Governesses, a Shoe-Black Society, and, in fact, all 
classes of indigent and impoverished persons are provided for. 

The Sick Children's Hospital is one of the best and most 
needed institutions in London. This hospital was opened eight- 
een years ago, and has among its patrons the excessively pious 



INTERESTING SIGHT. 433 

Prince of Wales, and the lady whom he admired so much — the 
wife of Sir Charles Mordaunt, as also the highest ecclesiastical 
authority in England, the Archbishop of Canterbury. This 
Hospital for Sick Children is situated at No. 49 Great Ormond 
street, Bloomsbury, in an old-fashioned house built in the 
time of Queen Anne. The annual income of this hospital 
is about ,£25,000 a year, Avith lOO beds, including about a 
dozen at Highgate and Margate, the latter for those children 
who require sea air. It has about 600 in-door and 12,000 out- 
door patients, annually. 

A sick child among the rich has, at least, solace in its sick- 
ness, besides every chance for its recovery that money can suj)- 
ply. A sick child among the poor may have attendance or not, 
as the case may be, but its father and its mother in London 
have but little time to bestow upon its sufferings. It is, per- 
haps, uncarcd for and all but abandoned to battle with disease 
without help. It is for the children of the needy poor that 
this hospital is established and is carried on. 

No child suffering from small pox is admitted into the 
house, nor are any cases of rickets, hip joint or scrofulous dis- 
ease of the spine or joint. They are refused for three reasons : 
because they are quite incurable, because they require noth- 
ing but rest for many months, and because good diet and 
fresh air, continued for months or years, are essential to im- 
provement. 

Glad children's laughter may be heard within those old walls, 
and pretty little voices murmuring to each other, as the tiny 
sick people chatter to their next bedside friends and neighbors. 
Sometimes a little tired one, wearied from weakness, lies still 
watching the blue scroll on the ceiling, or trying to make out 
what all the pink-cheeked and powdered ladies arc doing upon 
the frescoes of the old-fashioned walls. 

Each child has its cot to itself, and besides those in the house 
myriads of children are brought each year, by their mothers, to be 
seen by the doctors and nurses. In the room where mothers 
bring their children is a box, affixed to the wall, with a printed 
solicitation for pence, and fifty pounds a year is collected 
27 



434 



NAKED AND NEEDY. 



in this way, "n-liich is devoted to sending children to the water- 
ing places who are getting convalescent and need sea air. 

The Queen, and other members of her family, are accustomed 
to send yearly donations of toys and jimcracks for the amuse- 
ment of the children ; and proud ladies may be seen daily mov- 
ing among the sick beds with all kinds of gifts and childish 
luxuries, and who shall say that the faces of these beautiful 
girls, and the toys they bring, do not help most signally to es- 
tablish convalescence, for what sick child ever suffered without 
appreciating a kindly smile, a wooden horse, a cart, a Punch, 
or a Noah's ark. 



% 








CHAPTER XXIX. 

MARKETS AND FOOD. 

||HE aggregate of time, labor, and expenditure, 
necessary to provide three millions and a 
half of inhabitants with food, in a city like 
London, is something beyond comprehension. 
In getting at the food statistics of this great 
City, I found more trouble than in procuring 
material and detail for any other portion of this book. And 
yet there cannot be anything of more interest to the public than 
to know how, when, and from where, a ^reat city derives the 
food which subsists its citizens. 

The London markets are well built, well ventilated, well sit- 
uated, and well regulated. The markets of London are a credit 
to the city and people. The markets of New York are a scan- 
dal and a shame to that great city. 

Some idea may be formed of the amount of food needed to 
subsist London from the figiu-es which I will give. 

The Metropolitan Cattle Market, in Caledonian Eoad, Isling- 
ton, is the largest market in London, covering fifteen acres, 
and having three acres of slaugliter liouses. This market cost 
one million four hundred and sixty thousand pounds, and can- 
not be surpassed by any other market in the world. Tlie yearly 
receipts at this market was as follows : 860,000 beef cattle, 
36,000 calves, 1,900,000 sheep, and 37,650 pigs. Besides this 
vast amount of meat there was nearly as much more received 
at the Newgate, Leadenliall, and Whitechapel meat markets. 

The other articles of food, brought to tlic London markets, 
are estimated by those who profess to have nearly accurate in- 



436 MARKETS AND FOOD. 

formation, as follows : Seven million head of game and poultry, 
six hundred and fifty million pounds of fish, two hundred and 
fifty million barrels of oysters, and two hundred and fifty mil- 
lion cubic feet of eggs. Tliis last item rather staggered me, 
but the other estimated quantities are, I am assured, rather 
below than above the aggregate annual consumption. 

The inspections of the London markets are made very rigidly, 
and I do not wonder at the necessity for a strict watchfulness, 
when I find that, in 18G8, 100,340 pounds of meat, and 1,963 
head of game and poultry, were seized by the officers as being 
unfit for human food. This amount consisted in part of 1,200 
sheep, 180 pigs, 73 calves, 1,100 quarters of beef, 702 joints 
of meat, 402 tame fowls, 121 wild fowl, 300 geese, 290 ducks, 
316 pigeons, 15 lambs, and only thirty ])Ounds of sausages. 
There were also 239 rabbits, 111 hares, 75 haunches and quar- 
ters of venison, 84 partridges, and four pounds of pickled pork. 
It will be seen that there was a very great deal of beef and mut- 
ton to a very little pickled pork and sausage. All of the 
game, and most of the poultry seized, was putrid, and of the 
meat 108,000 pounds were diseased, while 21,000 pounds were 
stinking; 30,240 pounds of meat being taken from animals 
that had died of natural causes. As soon as the meat is seized 
it is sprinkled with creosote of coal tar, which checks putrefac- 
tion, and at the same time prevents it from being used as food, 
after which it is sent to the bone-boilers and destroyed. 

Besides the enormous amount of food received at the markets 
already enumerated, there was also received at the Borough 
Market, Southwark, Smithfield New Market, Newport Market, 
Cumberland, Portman, Clare, and the Potato Markets, by rail- 
way, in the same year, 17,000 tons of meat of all kinds, 100,- 
000 tons of potatoes, 14,000 tons of fish, 15,000 tons of vegeta- 
bles, and 60,000 tons of grain, wherewith to feed the Lon- 
doners. 

Before daybreak is the best time to see the Markets of Lon- 
don in all their bustle and brisk traffic, and one summer morn- 
ing I accordingly took a cab from the Langham Hotel and told 
the sleepy driver to take me to the New Smithfield Market, 



THE SMITHFIF.LD POLICE STATIOX. 437 

wliicli is convenient to Newgate Prison. We dashed madly in 
the gray of the morning (it was not yet more than four o'clock) 
through Regent street, up Oxford street, over the Holborn Via- 
duct, and so on to the Smithfield Police Station, which is sit- 
uated at a few rods distant from the place where the Cock 
Lane Ghost was first discovered. 

I had been directed by Inspector Bailey, of the Old Jewry 
office, to call at this police station, and he informed me that 
I shoidd find a special policeman there at my disposal to show 
me the markets, and procure me any information I might de- 
sire in regard to them. 

The Smithfield Police Station is like most London police 
stations, a very quiet and not pretentious edifice, just in the 
shadow of Smithfield New Market. 

There was a little desk and a little railing, behind which sat 
a little man in a blue uniform of pilot cloth, and behind the 
little man were hung upon the plainly w^hitewashed Avails a 
collection of handcuffs, pistols, and knives, all of which were 
deodands to the law. There were also placards, offering re- 
wards for all kinds of oifenders, thieves, forgers, murderers, and 
embezzlers, and giving detailed descriptions of their persons 
and clothing when last seen. These placards covered the walls, 
but did not add much to the appearance of the apartment. On 
producing my letter of introduction from Inspector Bailey to 
the Sergeant in command — who treated me with much civility, 
a bell was rung by the latter, and a policeman in uniform 
appeared, my old friend Ralfe, whom the Sergeant addressed 
as follows : 

" Ralfe, you are to take this gentleman all through Smith- 
field Market, and show him the sights, and then you can trans- 
fer him to some one else to have him taken through Billings- 
gate Market, and after that he may take a look at Covent Gar- 
den Market, if he so desires. Show him everything that you 
can, then report to me back again." 

"Yesir," said Mr. Ralfe, touching his hat, although he was 
not in uniform, and in another instant we were in the London 



438 MARKETS AND FOOD. 

streets, which were very drear and damp, the gas lamps yet 
burning with a feeble light, and the daybreak as yet not having 
revealed itself. 

The way was murky and dark, and the vicinity of the mar- 
ket was sufficiently indicated by the peculiar raw, fresh smell, 
with which newly killed meat greets the nasal organs. 

Smithfield ^Market is built on a large, open square, and being 
on liigh ground commands a good view of the City of London 
proper. The site of the New Market which was opened a year 
ago, was formerly covered by the Cattle Market, which is now 
removed to Islington, in tlie suburbs. The building is of mix- 
ed stone and brick, and the cost was about half a million 
pounds. The ground on which it is built is also nearly as val- 
uable as the building. The market is about four hundred 
feet in length and a hundred and fifty in width. The roof 
is of iron, and a vast avenue, high, broad, and spacious in every 
way, runs through the entire building. 

"When I reached the market with my friend, the policeman, 
the gas- was still burning, and the long rows of stalls situated 
on the wide avenues of the market, were covered witli beef 
and mutton, the stalls averaging tliirty to forty feet in height. 
There was a confused hum of many voices, and coarse rough 
looking fellows in smalls and canvas smocks, with broad, scoop- 
shaped hats, rushed hither and thither with immense loins and 
quarters of beef on their brawny shoulders. Over each stall, 
and inside of the market beneath the roof, the proprietor or 
lessee of the stall has a small wooden edifice, with doors and 
windows and places to sleep for two or three persons. At each 
coiner of the market is a lofty tower, a hundred feet high, and 
in these towers are board-rooms and dining-rooms, and reading 
rooms for select parties, and at the base or bottom floor of 
each tower is a bar where liquors and hot coffee, bread, butter, 
and tea, and other refreshments are sold during the early hours 
of the morning, to tliose who need sustainmcnt. Two or 
three prety girls were behind each of these stalls, and were 
serving with great dilligencc and taste, the knots of butchers* 



THE HOT COFFEE GIRL. 439 

helpers, cartmeii, butchers' boys, and market officials who 
stood in their vicinity. 

There are at least half a dozen meat inspectors in each 
market, and these men are paid one hundred pounds a year to 
examine and decide as to the wholesomeness of each and every 
pound or carcass of meat brought into the markets. 

To one of these I spoke and asked him if he had much 
trouble with the butchers in regard to putrid meat. 

"Trouble — Lord bless you sir, we have no troul^le here to 
speak on. Ye see, sir, the class of butchers as sells meat here 
in Smitlifield Market allers sells on commission. All this 
meat that you see a hanging on these ere hooks doesn't belong 
to the butchers. It is sent to them to sell on commission by 
the Railway Companies, and they do not own the stalls them- 
selves either. They pays one pound ten shilling and sixpence 
a week for five square feet of ground — that's about the rate 
they pays, and the City owns the markit. Lord bless you. Sir," 
said the loquacious inspector, who was dressed like a butcher, 
having an apron, and stood leaning against a large quarter of 
beef. "I don't know where all the blessed meat comes from, 
but I knows that the pigs come from Hireland, and a goodish bit 
of the beef from Devonshire. It comes to the city by the 
Underground Railway, and you can see the place down stairs 
where all the meat comes in the mornin'." 

At tlie breakfast stalls I noticed that nearly every one called 
for "two pennorth of bread and butter," and drank with it a 
bowl of hot tea or a smoking cup of coffee. The girls who 
served the coffee were chatty and lively, and desired informa- 
tion of me in regard to America. One of them, a little black 
brunette, queried : 

" They say, sir, as how that a young leedy in Hamerica can 
got married on nothink — if she's good looking and can cook. 
Is it so, sir ?" 

I had no means of satisfying her as to that question, and I 
left her as she was preparing a sandwich for a lumgry clod- 
hopper, whose eyes wore bulbous with hunger and exj^ectation, 



440 MARKETS AND FOOD. 

and went below to the basement story, which opens by arches on 
the depot of the Underground Railway, and I found the entire 
earthen floor cut up by rails and platforms, on to which the 
meat from incoming trains is slumtcd and delivered. All meat 
delivered at Smithfield is of course dead, and no slaughtering 
is carried on in this market. Millions of pounds worth of 
meat finds its way here day after day, and thousands of 
men — porters and helpers and butchers' assistants — find em- 
Ijloymcnt here, their wages ranging from ten to thirty-five 
sliillings a week. 

Each helper is paid so much for every carcass which he car- 
ries into the market on his shoulders, and broad shoulders they 
have to be to carry those huge quarters of beef from the wag- 
ons which are drawn up in dense masses in and around the 
open spaces outside of the market walls. When this market 
was opened by the Mayor of London and other city dignitaries, 
sixteen hundred officials, connected with the market and the 
municipal government, dined in the central avenue, and two 
liundred barrels of ale were drank. This is a sample of a 
municipal British feast. 

Outside of the building are little houses or market lodges, 
built of stone, in which are weighing machines, where men 
are constantly in attendance as weighers of beef and mutton. 
For this service they are paid one hundred and twenty pounds 
a year. The weigliing machine in the little house connects 
under the middle of tlie street, wliere a platform is constructed, 
level witli the surface of the pavement, and when a cart-load 
of beef is to be weighed, horse, cart, and beef are weighed to- 
gether, and the total is placed on a slate, and when the helpers 
liave carried all the meat into the stalls in the market to be 
sold wholesale, (for it is not a retail market,) tlie horse and cart 
are again weighed, and then theirunited weight having been de- 
ducted from tlie gross weight, the actual weight of the meat is 
thus ascertained by this simple and easy process. I think that 
the Smithfield Market is the finest I ever saw, and its ventila- 
tion and perfect system cannot be surpassed anywhere. 

From Smithfield Market I went to Covent Garden Market, 



THE VEGETABLE MARKET. 441 

which is a couple of miles distant, in Russell street, forming 
quite a spacious area. This is the proat vegetable and flower 
market of London. There is a market held every morning in 
summer,but in winter, mai'kcts are licld only on Tuesday, Tlun-s- 
day, and Saturday mornings. The market is owned by the 
Duke of Bedford, and was built at a cost of X 30,000 by a for- 
mer Duke of that family, forty years ago. 

It has a collonade running around the entire building on the 
exterior, under wliich are shops having apartments in the up- 
per stories. Joined to the back of these is another row of 
shops facing the inner courts, and through the centre runs a 
passage with shops on either side, in which are exposed for 
sale hcrl)s and flowers, and the most magnificent bouquets can 
be procured here on a fine morning in summer. Scarce and 
delicate plants and flowers are here found in abundance, and 
around these stands I noticed numbers of male servants and 
pages in the liveries of some of the best known families among 
the London aristocracy, barganing for bouquets for their mis- 
tresses' tables. The noise and hubbub around the open spaces 
in this market was perfectly deafening. It was noAv about four 
o'clock in the morning, and all the open areas were thronged 
with market-men and women and boys, carrying baskets and 
flowers in their arms, to and fro, chaffing each other or cursing 
and swearing with great good will. 

Immense vans and market-carts loaded down witli cabbages, 
onions, peas, cauliflowers, turnips, beans, parsley, greens, 
cucumbers, lettuce, apples, pears, parsnips, and other vegetables 
and fruits, are moving to and fro, some of them blocked in 
with the increasing traffic, the drivers, great big hulking fel- 
lows, mopping their perspiring foreheads and shouting at each 
other, as is usual among all cartmen. Women are hurrying 
hither and thither, making bargains and chaffering about the 
prices of vegetables, and meanwhile, it is almost impossible to 
hear or understand anything that is said. Tlie police who are 
scattered here and there with their tall helmets, goodnaturedly 
push and shove those who block the passage ways, and frown 
sternly at the impudent young rascals who excite crowds and 



442 MARKETS AND FOOD. 

gatlicr small knots of boys against the breakfast stalls outside 
the market. 

Here and there around these coffee stalls, which arc generally- 
kept by old men or dilapidated and ancient -svomen, you will 
see a couple of drunken or half sober roysterers, who have 
been on the tramp all night, and have at this early hour of the 
morning reached Covent Garden to get a cup of hot cofTcc in 
tlic market, which will clear the fumes of the liquor away, before 
they stagger home to a fond and anxious wife or an unrelent- 
ing landlady. 

Wagons and carts have been arriving from a very early hour, 
and five o'clock seems to be the busiest time in Covent Gar- 
den. The houses of refreshment around the market are open at 
half past one in summer, and little tables are placed against the 
wooden pillars of the market by the tea and coffee venders, 
from which porters and carters make liearty breakfasts. There 
is no need to resort to exciting liquors, as the coffee is good 
and hot, and a baked potato, fresh and smoking from the oven, 
costs only one penny. 

Every few mimitcs, through all the roaring and shouting, 
singing, talking, whistlijig, and laughing, I could hear the 
clear voice of the Baked Potato man, vending his smoking 
tubers and shouting : 

"Tateshot!— all 'ot, 'ot! Taters all 'ot." His can with 
its steam pipe, from which issues forth a fragant odor on the 
morning air, is already surrounded by young street boys, who 
will run an errand for a penny, hold your horse, catch a flying 
hat, steal a cabbage or a pocket full of j)otatoes from the stalls 
with equal impartiality and energy.' These markets are the 
worst places in London for young lads, as there is always some 
excuse for their presence in the vicinity, under pretence of 
earning a penny or picking up the refuse and odds and ends 
of a vegetable market. Observe this young rascal now, who 
is surveying the Baked Potato man with an assumption of scorn 
combined with a profound look of wisdom in his fcatm-cs. His 
hands are in his pockets, his trousers are ragged to the knees, 
and his linen is nowhere visible — a miserable London street 



I 



n 



THE POTATO MAN GETS ANGRY. 445 

boy — and jct you would imagine, to look at him as he steps up 
to negotiate for a potato, that he was tlie agent of the Roths- 
childs about to make arrangements for a loan. His age does not 
exceed fifteen years, and he has been sleeping in the purlieus of 
the market all night, as his ragged and soiled coat testify, 
and his hair is full of slimy straws which he has accumulated 
while reclining his head on a market gardener's basket. The 
Baked Potato man eyes him with distrust and timidity, for he 
is well aware that there is no profit to be made from him, and 
that he is about to " chaff" him. The young rascals who stand 
around are all wide awake, and await the contest with solici- 
tude in their countenances. 

" Taters all 'ot— taters all 'ot— 'ot— 'ot," cries the Potato 
Man. 

" Well, guv'nor, I see you're a keepin the steam upas usual. 
Vet's the wcrry lowest figger you names for the werry best 
taters, takin a lot — takin a quantity ? I feels like patronizin 
you, I docs." 

"Penny a-piece, all 'ot — 'ot." 

"A penny a-piece for baked taters, and the Funds agoin down 
like winkin ! Yy, I 'ad a pine apple myself out of a Garden 
this mornin for two-pence. Trade's unkimmon bad, guv'nor." 

"Penny apiece — all 'ot — all 'ot — I say, keep your dirty fin- 
gers away from the can. You doesn't buy anythink, I know." 

"1 doesn't buy hanythink, eh ? There's a hopposition can, 
too, started by a gentleman of my acquaintance" — here the 
yountr scamp put his thumbs in his waistcoat armholes and in- 
flated himself after the supposed aristocratic fashion — " in the 
'Aymarket. He calls the can the ' Gladstone,' and it's a 
werry spicy concern, I tell ye. Don't he give prime taters 
neither ? They're real nobby ones, and plenty o' butter, and 
pepper, and salt. Oh ! not at all ! And its so werry resj)ecta- 
ble for a cove comin from the Hopera to stop and have a bit of 
supper on his road home. My heye, and haint the pro-prc-i- 
c-tor a makin of his fortin neither? Of course not ! Oh, no. But 
there 'ill be fun when he returns to his willa with a postchiy 
in Belgrawey in a few years." 



446 MARKETS AND FOOD. 

By this time the Baked Potato man is pretty mad, between 
the pertinacity of his young tormentor and the higlily colored 
picture of his rival's prosperity, as depicted by the boy, and he 
tells him in an angry way to "move lion, hif 'e doesn't want 
'is preshis neck stretched." 

" Wot, wiolence to one of her Majesty's subjecks, and hin 
the hopen day, too ? Move hon, hey? Oh, worry likely. I'm 
a standin 'ere on my Sovrin's kerbstone — a Briton's 'Ousc is 'is 
castle, and wiien an Englishman hexpresses his hopinion hon 
the subjcck of baked taters he's to move hon, is he? Conseke- 
vently I'll stay here." 

The "Baked Tater" man is now almost foaming at the 
mouth with rage, which is not lessened by the cheers of the 
spectators, who are, of course, on the side of the young orator. 

He is about to lay down his can and pitch into his torment- 
or, when all at once that young gentleman assumes a pacific 
attitude, after disjilaying so much public spirit, and says : 

" I don't want money nor credit, so look sharp ole feller and 
pick me a stunner from the Can." 

At this moment the Potato Man's countenance relaxes, as 
the boy produces a penny-piece, and while he extracts a mealy 
potato from his can, the boy proceeds to amuse his audience 
further l)y going through a series of sleight of hand tricks, such 
as shaking the coin out of his cap after having swallowed it, or 
thrusting it into his eye and bringing it out of his ear, assuring 
the spectators the while that he had spent £20,000 m learning 
these tricks, and now, when the potato is handed to him, 
smoking hot, he expresses his indignation at the fact that the 
butter is " shaved too thin," and demands that what he loses 
in butter shall be made up to him by an extra shake of the 
pepper-box. At last lie goes off to eat the potato, as the gray 
dawn breaks, and the man at the Can says : 

" Oh, my eye — he is a precious leary cove for such a young 
von." 

This market, as well as all the other London markets, is 
haunted with beggars who appeal to the charity of strangers 
/with Gi'eat effect. 



FRUIT AND VEGETABLES. 447 

One of these sat up behind a pile of empty baskets, and I 
saw tliat his trousers had rotted away at the bottom from hjug 
use and dirt. His face was that of a prematurely aged young 
man, and his torn shirt and worn features bespoke real misery. 
He was deaf and dumb it seemed, and the manner in which he 
solicited alms was by pointing to the following sentence, writ- 
ten on the flag-stone before him with a piece of chalk : 



j I AM Starving. Help me. | 

A rental of about £26,000 a year is derived from Covent 
Garden Market by its proprietor, the Duke of Bedford, and the 
shops and stalls rent at from two to four hundred pounds a 
year. In the immediate neighborhood is Covent Garden 
Theatre, and all the little old rookeries of chop houses in this 
quarter have the smell of the greenroom and the rehearsal 
lingering about them. Here was, formerly, the garden of the 
Convent of Westminster. 

Before the construction of the present market this was one of 
the most dangerous places in London with its tumble-down and 
crazy old structures, where abounded people of both sexes herded 
together like pigs. The Convent has become a play-house, and 
the monks and nuns have been transposed into actors and ac- 
tresses. Where the salad was cut for the Lady Abbess in past 
times, drunkards now brawl and attack each other, and the flow- 
ers that would have been in the olden time plucked to adorn the 
statues of the Virgin or St. Peter, are now chosen to grace the 
marble mantel of some proud dame of Belgravia, or some gaudy 
and painted courtezan of Pimlico. The foreign fruit trade of 
Covent Garden is very extensive in pine apples, melons, cher- 
ries, apples, and plums. Pine apples "were first cried in the 
London streets at "a penny a slice," twenty-five years ago. 
To supply this market with vegetables alone, 25,000 acres are 
required to be cultivated, and about 10,000 acres of trees 
are necessary to supply its annual demand for fruit. The 
trade in water-cresses is immense and they are chiefly hawked 
about the markets by little girls, although, of course, every stall 
has its own stock of cresses. They supply the same want as a 



448 MARKETS AND FOOD. 

relish for the Londoners' table that the- small red radishes do 
to an American's appetite. 

A man, curious in such things, has estimated as follows the 
yearly sales of this appetizing little green relish : 

Covent Garden Market, 2,000,000 bunches, Farringdon 
Market, 15,000,000 bunches, Borough Market, (Southwark), 
1,000,000 bunches, Spitalfield's Market, 500,000 bunches, Port- 
man Market, 200,000 bunches, and Oxford Market, 200,000 
bunches. It will be seen that Cockneys relish greens very 
much. 

A little of everything can be procured at Covent Garden. 
Here are peddlers of account books, lead pencils, watch chains, 
dog-collars, whips, chains, curry-combs, pastry, money-bags, 
tissue-paper for the tops of strawberry-pottles, and horse-chest- 
nut leaves for garnishing fruit-stalls ; coffee-stalls, and stalls 
of pea-soup and pickled eels; basket-makers; women making 
up nosegays ; and girls splitting huge bundles of water-cresses 
into little bunches. 

Here are fruits and vegetables from all parts of the world ; 
peas, and asparagus, and new potatoes, from the south of France, 
Belgium, Holland, Portugal, and the Bermudas, are brought 
in steam-vessels. Besides Deptford onions, Battcrsea cabbages, 
Mortlake asparagus, Chelsea celery, and Charlton peas, im- 
mense quantities are brought by railway from Cornwall and 
Devonshire, the Isle of Man, Guernsey and Jersey, the Kentish 
and Essex banks of the Thames, the banks of the Humber, the 
Mersey, the Orwell, the Trent, and the Ouse. 

The Scilly Isles send early articles by steamer to Southami> 
ton, and thence to Covent Garden by railway. Strawberries 
are sent from gardens about Bath. The money paid aniuially 
for fruits and vegetables sold in this market is estimated at 
three millions sterling: for 6 or 700,000 pottles of strawber- 
ries; 40,000,000 cabbages; 2,000,000 cauliflowers; 300,000 
bushels of peas ; 750,000 lettuces; and 500,000 bushels of on- 
ions. In Centre-row, hot-liouse grapes are sold at 25s. per 
pound, British Queen and Black Prince strawberries at Is. per 
ounce, slender French beans at 3s. per hundred, peas at a 



THE jews' orange MARKET. 449"" 

guinea a quart, and new potatoes at 48. Qd. per pound ; a moss- 
rose for half-a-crown, and bouquets of flowers from one shilling 
to two guineas each. 

Green peas have been sold here at Christmas when they are 
deemed a luxury, for three pounds a quart, and asparagus has 
brought, in the same season, a pound, and rhubarb, a pound 
and five shillings a bunch. 

The cries of the children peddling violets are sometimes 
almost heartrending, as these little waifs are very often fasting 
for a whole day before they can realize a few pennies to buy 
their food, to say nothing of food for those who have sent them 
to peddle the violets. 

There is an Artesian well under Covent Garden ]\Iarket, 
280 feet deep, which supplies 1,600 gallons an hour, sufficient 
for the needs of the market people, most of which is consumed 
in watering flowers and vegetables, or in giving horses to drink. 
There are elegant conservatories over the collonades of the mar- 
ket fifteen feet broad and fifteen feet high, for the preservation 
of the more costly and delicate plants and flowers. From this 
market nearly all the button-hole flowers which are vended at 
from a penny to four-pence a piece are obtained for the use of 
the London " swells." 

One of the most curious places in London is the Orange and 
Nut Market, in Hounsditch. This market is chiefly in the 
hands of the lowest kind of Jews, men in greasy garments, and 
having frightfully hooked noses. The Costermongers come here 
for oranges, nuts, and lemons, to sell or hawk them around the 
suburbs or slums of London. The market is called Dukes'- 
Place Market. There is a big, massive. Synagogue, a lot of 
ancient-looking houses, the oranges themselves have a cob- 
webbed appearance, and the jjeople are all dingy here. Tlie 
nuts are for sale in sacks, and the baskets have a dilapidated 
look. The Jews, in all countries, are an industrious and eco- 
nomical people, and in London, as elsewhere, they monopolize 
the most profitable and least laborious occupations. They are 
represented by lawyers, members of Parliament, great bankers, 
like Rothschild, merchants, like Solomons, and men of liberal 



450 



MARKETS AND FOOD. 



taste, like Sir Francis Goldsmid. The number of Jews in 
London is estimated at 48,000. 

Each dwelling around this Orange Market seems as if it had 
been partially consumed by fire, for not one of the shops have a 
window, and tlicy are comparatively empty, save wliere a crate of 
oranges, or a bag of nuts, are exposed for sale. A few sickly fowls, 




THE ORANGE MARKET. 



looking as if they were dyspeptic, wander here picking up 
crumbs among the orange baskets and nut sacks, and dirty, 
ragged little Jewish children, play around with great equanim- 
ity among the rubbish. The disputes among the loud-voiced 
Costermongers who come here with their little wagons and jack- 
asses, to draw their fruit, and the Jews who have all glib-toned, 
smooth voices, — at some times, when the oranges are chang- 
ing hands from sellers to buyers — are very amusing. 

There I saw slatternly-looking girls sorting the good from 
the bad fruit, and one big, tall Jewish wench, was engaged over 



FAKUINUDOX MARKET. 451 

a barrel of common black grapes, plunging her dirty arms 
down in the barrel and pulling up the decayed fruit which 
she gave to a little child wlio stood by lier, and ate of them 
greedily from her hand. Some of these Jewish fruit-traders 
take in as much as .£200 in a day's sale of oranges, from Cos- 
termongers. Most of these oranges are sent to the Jews on 
commission. Years ago the Jew boys had a monopoly of the 
orange peddling trade, but now the monopoly is in the hands 
of Irish boys, Avho are more eloquent, more aggressive, and 
more popular, than the Jews, and consequently sell they more 
fruit. , 

Farringdon ^Market, near the Strand, on the sloping surface 
of the hill, upon which the Holborn and Fleet street stand, is 
one of tlie principal markets in London, though it covers but an 
acre and a half. The ground and buildings cost about X200,- 
000. The market building is 480 feet long at the centre, 41 
feet high, and 48 feet broad, and has a court-yard in the centre 
of which the wagons, and baskets, and market lumber, are placed. 
The court, or, as it is called, the quadrangle, is generally filled 
with vegetables and fruit. 




28 



CHAPTER XXX. 




SECRETS OF A RIVER. 

T had been a stormy night in the London streets. 
In the Strand tlie shopkeepers' assistants were 
luirriedly fastening tlie slmtters upon the win- 
dows of their masters shops, eager to escape 
the hurricane of rain which swej)t over the 
London housetops, and tore tlirough the lanes 
of brick and mortar hke an enraged fiend. 
Tliirsty souls who were draining huge mugs of 
malt liquor in the many publics along Thames street, looked 
out with scared faces on the river which was beating its sides 
angrily against the shipping and lesser craft. 

The waters of the Thames ran high and wild, and down in 
the Pool and by Limehouse Reach, huge ships bearing the 
colors of many nations at their peaks, swung and rocked in 
the seething tides, while black night and the angry shades of 
the coming storm gathered around their twinkling red and 
blue signal lamps, which lazily danced from their yards over 
the surface of the river, leaving faint streaks of light that 
were ever and anon swallowed by the angry waters. Boatmen 
were anxiously securing wherries and fastening them under 
bridges and by water-stairs, and all the while the clouds above 
lowered, and the sweeping gusts of rain stung the faces of 
those who were unfortunate enough to be in the streets without 
shelter. Shutters slapped and banged in and out, and chimney 
pots were whirled about by the fierce and howling winds. 
I had been on a tour of inspection, with a friend and a police 



THE STRANGER AT WATERLOO BRIDGE. 453 

sergeant, tlirougli London during the night, and liad left the 
Alharabra at midnight for Evan's Supper Rooms, in Covent 
Garden, where we passed an hour listening to the music of the 
glee and madrigal boys, and on leaving Evan's at one o'clock 
in the morning, my friend had parted with me to go to bed, 
and I left him at the corner of Wellington street and the Strand, 
he going westward to his residence in Westminster, while the 
police Sergeant and myself called a cab, as I liad a desire to 
see London in the small hours, and Sergeant Scott had insinu- 
ated that a stormy night was the best for seeing strange sights. 
He little thought at the time liow truly he spoke. 

After some discussion between this veteran of the Old 
Jewry office and myself, it was decided that we should visit 
some of the thieves haunts in the Borough of Soutliwark, as it 
was about the hour when tliese night birds came home to roost, 
and of a consequence the best time to see their places of resi- 
dence. 

The first place chosen for a visit was a den in the New Kent 
Road, and to get there it was necessary for us to cross Water- 
loo Bridge. 

To cross some of the bridges in London it is necessary to 
pay a trifling toll, which goes toward tlic repairs of tlic bridge. 
The charge for each pedestrian on Westminster and Waterloo 
Bridges is half a j^cnny each — for a liorse one penny. As the 
cab dashed up to the turnstile at Waterloo Bridge, the toll 
keej^er came out to take his dues, a gruff looking fellow wrap- 
jx^d up in a big hairy coat. lie took the two pence grumblingly, 
and just at that moment I noticed a woman coming up to the 
toll-house in a gaudy looking silk dress, and having a soiled 
velvet wrapper about licr shivering shoulders. The light from 
the toll-house shone on her face, which was very pale, tlie eyes 
burning with a strange light, and the garments which hung to 
her figure were dripping with the rain. 

" Please let me pass," said she to the gruff toll keeper, with 
an imploring glance, "I have not a penny in the world — i)leasc 
let me cross the bridge ?" 

" Please let yer cross the bridge — yer 'aint got a penny ? 



454 SECRETS OF A RIVER. 

Well wot d'ye want ter cross the bridge for then ? If ycr 'aint 
got a h'ai^cnny I thinks ycr as well on the one side of the bridge 
as the other ? Well go on with ye, I don't mind a h'apcnny, 
and go to bed as soon as ye can," the toll keeper shouted 
through tlic storm after the wretched woman as she dashed 
througli the turnstile on the bridge, and was lost in the storm 
and darkness of the night. 

As slie fled into the night, my companion caught sight of 
her face, and a hasty exclamation escaped his lips. 

" My God, tliat's Mag S , that we saw to-night at the 

Alhambra I D'ye remember that pale faced girl who asked 
you to give her some liquor in the Canteen ?" 

" The woman who seemed out of her senses or crazed, and 
who danced and swore ?" I asked. 

" Yes sir, the same — avcU that's her, and what she can be 
doing here on this bridge at this time I don't know. She used 
to be a highflyer once, did Mag, but her fancy man has left 
her, and I'm afraid she's dead broke now, at times. My eye, 
wot a temper she has to be sure, when she blazes hup." 

By this time we had reached the end of the bridge at the 
Southwark side, and the cab dashed madly by a female figure 
cowering in an alcove of the structure, the cabby swearing an 
oath as the horse shied at it going by. 

As the night advanced, it blew harder and harder, and the 
storm raged with great violence. The waters under the bridge 
rebounded against the base of the stone arches, but the rain 
had ceased. We were now on our route back to tlie city, hav- 
ing inspected the dens of thievery to my great satisfaction. 
While going and coming, until we reached the bridge again, 
the mind of my companion. Sergeant Scott, seemed ill at ease 
in regard to the woman whom we had met upon the bridge be- 
fore we had crossed. He was anxious and uneasy, and talked 
of tlie meeting incessantly, to my surprise. 

" Some'ow or anuther I don't like meeting that gal on the 
bridge, Sir," said he. " She looked a little desperate, and when 
they looks that way I don't like to see 'em near water. Its 
touch and go with 'em then.'* 



THREE o'clock. 455 

"Do yoii fear that tlie girl will attempt to commit suicide ?" 
said I to him. 

"I do, Sir. You see there's twelve hundred suicides in London 
every year, and half of 'cm or more drowns themselves. The 
gals are more fonder of the water than the men. A man will blow 
his brains out or take pison, but a gal allers takes to the water. 
Why, bless you. Sir, we have as many as a hundred and twenty 
suicides lioff this here Waterloo Bridge every year. And this 
is their favorite bridge, this Waterloo Bridge. When they 
haven't got a penny in the world, and no friends, then they 
leap hoff the battelmints." 

By this time we had reached the toll gate again, and the cab 
horse was walking slowly over the stone floor of the bridge, 
making echoes with his feet. The bridge was quite dark, yet I 
could sec the buildings and spires on the London side piercing 
the skies, and the railway dcjiot at Charing Cross Bridge, the 
towers of the Parliament Houses, and the square roofs of the 
St. Thomas' Hospitals rising vaguely and in shadows above the 
river. 

There are stone alcoves on all the London bridges, which 
bulge out in a semi-circular form over the water on eitlier side, 
and they will each accommodate a dozen persons, should such a 
number wish to sit down and look at the river. There arc 
eight of these alcoves on Waterloo Bridge, and a raised side- 
walk runs along on each side of the road, of solid and smooth 
flagging. The middle of the bridge is taken up by a causeway 
fifty or sixty feet wide, and this causeway is paved with a sort 
of Russ, or ratlicr large Belgian pavement. 

Tlie cabby had stopjied his horse to give me an opportunity 
to take a look at the river. 

One boom — two booms— three booms ! The bell in the Clock 
Tower at Westminster rolled out over the river. Three o'clock 
of a stormy morning, and all London asleep. It was a grand 
and impressive sight, the dark river, with bridge after bridge 
girdling it, and nothing to be heard but the champing of the 
horse in the awful stillness of that lone hour. Hark ! There 
are voices on the bridge, voices passionate and imploring, that 



456 SECRETS OF A RIVER. 

seem to shudder over the water and to creep through the arches 
of the bridge. 

" Let us get out of tlic cab and sec what it is, Sir, if you 
please. Tlicre's sonic cadgers a bunking in tliis vicinity, I 
imagines, "said the police odficer. 

We walked along the bridge for a hundred feet or so, but 
could see nothing, although we heard the voices still. 

" There's something wrong a-goin' on, but I don't know wot 
it is," said he again. 

We advanced still further, and could sec a woman's figure 
half hidden by tlie alcove which was across on the otlier side 
of the bridge from us. The woman was in earnest converea- 
tion with a man, who spoke in a clear, manly voice to her. 

" This is the woman that begged the toll-gate man to let her 
cross to-night cos she hadn't a tanner," said the officer to me. 
" Let's watch 'em," said he ; and feeling that it was an ad- 
venture of some sort, I silently acquiesced. We concealed 
ourselves in an alcove or embrasure. 

" Keep quiet, now, and we'll see something, sure," said the 
Sergeant. 

And we kept very quiet for a few minutes. The man was 
talking earnestly with the woman, wlio seemed half crazy with 
drink or excitement, we could not tell which, as we could only 
hear snatches of the conversation now and then. 

It was the man's voice which we now heard. 

" Come home, for God's sake, Margaret, and all will be well. 
You will be forgiven, and nothing will ever be cast up to you. 
I'll pledge you my word to that. Your mother is in the city, 
and your fatlier is dead. She has come up from Glastonbury 
to see you, and I've spent eight nights walking for you, and 
hoping to get a sight of a face that was once dearer to me than 
life, and is now even still dear to me, if it only was to see you 
reformed, poor, unfortunate girl. Come home, for God's sake. 
Make the attempt, and it will be all well once more." 

The girl was sobljing now very hard. The man seemed to 
implore her by all that had ever been sacred or dear to the lost 



WEARY OF LIFE. 457 

girl, and she was evidently moved by his tone and earnestness, 
and the recollections that he had called forth. 

" He's doin' of his best, and we can't do any tliink more — 
liany of us," said tlie Sergeant, who seemed a little touched. 

" You talk to me of my motlier, Harry ? Wliy, I liave not 
heard tliat name in tlirce years. I thought I'd never hear it 
again. I have thouglit of her, too. But it's too late, Harry. 
The girl that my mother expects to see is the bright little 
Maggie, the school-girl who never had a hard word or an un- 
kind look from her. I liad an innocent face then, and was not 
afraid to meet her kind old eyes. But now, to meet her in this 
garb " — and she shook her flaunting silks — " I dare not — I 
dare not. Harry, I tell you it is too late. Too late. Too 
late." 

" It's never too late, poor girl," said the stranger, " come 
home at once, or if you'll wait here a moment I'll go and call 
a cab and take you home to your mother at once. Wait here 
a moment and I will get a cab. Wait a moment, Maggie, only 
a moment:" and the stranger ran across the bridge, up King 
William street, and in the direction of the Bank, where he ex- 
pected to find a cab. 

The lost girl was left alone. Alone with night and solitude. 
Alone with naught but her past life, which arose from the wa- 
ters like a shadow to keep her company. Alone and miscraljle, 
with the cruel sky darkling above her as if to shut out all hope, 
while the river yawned and gaped beneath, seeking an offering. 
God unliccded, her bosom cold as a stone ; no prayer to con- 
quer her anguish ; with memories of promises broken and 
tender words unsaid ; the passionate love of a fond mother 
given in vain ; and at last an atonement is to be made. The 
old, old story — betrayal, dislionor, and the grave. 

We crept nearer by some unknown impulse, to where she 
stood, and could hear her talking to herself, though we could 
not sec her features, or anything definite, but a weird figure 
looming up like a shadow against tlie balustrade of tlie bridge. 
Her voice, wliich had fallen to a murnmr almost, was like some 
forgotten music, the strains of whicli arc lieard in a dream. 



458 SECRETS OF A RIVER. 

Who was this lone, wretched girl, and why came she here at 
this hour ? 

" My God, why should I go back to shame my poor old 
mother ? I never will. I cannot do it. The sight of her 
would blast me. And Charley, for whom I lost all, where is 
he ? In India, and no one here to-night, and I alone with my 
black thoughts on this spot. Why am I here ? What do I live 
for ? My life has been wretched enough. Why prolong it any 
longer ? I will settle the matter now and forever. Good-by, 
Mother," said the wretched girl, looking up at the sky, and 
before she could be stopped in her fearful purpose, she had 
mounted the parapet by the embrasure, and leaped with a shriek 
into the devouring river beneath. 

" By Heavens," said the Sergeant, darting forward and mak- 
ing an effort to catch at her clothes as her figure disappeared, 
" she has made a hole in the Avater with herself." At this 
moment a patrolman, hearing the girl scream and the shouts 
of the policeman, appeared upon the parapet. All three of' us 
dashed down the stairs of the old bridge, and it Avas the work 
of a moment only to get a boat out, which, fortunately, 
had the oars inside. In a minute we were all out on the 
river, and the tide running very fast in the direction of the 
Pool — after pulling towards the middle arch the Sergeant 
cried out: 

" Steady your rudder, there ; what's that bobbing up and 
down on the water ? That's a woman's head, sure ; she's got 
hoops, too ; that's lucky. Pull away, for your lives !" 

In a few moments we were alongside of the dark, floating 
object, and the patrolman, drawing his lantern out, threw its 
reflection over the waters, while the head of the boat was kept 
well up to the dismal object. 

The policeman leaned over the gunwale of the skiff and 
caught at the dress, and dragged in what he supposed to be 
a woman's body, Init was only a bundle of rags and straw, the 
refuse of some lodging-house bed. 

This was a severe disappointment to all in the boat, and we 



SADLY IMPORTUNATE. 459 

looked at each other without speaking, for a minute. The Ser- 
geant had a scared look, and said aloud : 

" I'm afraid poor Mag's gone. She must have struck the 
bottom of the arches when she went down, and if she did, all's 
over and settled. Tlie tide's running fast, too, and we will 
have hard work to find lier." 

For half an hour the most diligent search was made for 
her body, hut no traces could be found of it but a bonnet 
and shawl, which were caught in some floating wood below 
the bridge. 

We left the bridge, and the cab was driven home slowly, 
after the nearest police station had been notified of the poor 
girl's death or disappearance. The Sergeant of the Police 
District said that he Avould have another search in the morning, 
and I remained at the station to accompany the police in their 
visit. 

A little after day-break we were on Waterloo bridge again, 
and even at that hour a small assemblage had gathered around 
some object at the Southwark end of the bridge, wlicre we could 
see the tall lielmets of two policemen in the midst of the crowd 
of carters and market gardeners, who were en route to Covent 
Garden Market, and had stopped to look upon the body of a 
woman who had been fished up from the river. 

Yes, there lay the body of the girl whose toll to eternity had 
been paid by her own rash act — stretched out on the cold 
stones, her garments dripping, her fingers clinched, and her 
eyes stark wide open. A young woman she was, but oh, how 
worn ! The face was pinclicd, and the long, silken lashes sunk 
into the eyebrows. 

The day was breaking in the East, but the policemen held 
their lanterns, which they had not yet extinguished, over the 
poor, pale features, and the grimy garments, revealing the long, 
matted, and tangled hair, and the stark, cold body, wliich liad 
once held an Immortal Soul, but was now all tliat remained of 
the gay, merry-hearted, lost girl, who had fully reaped tlie 
harvest of vice — the Wages of Sin — called by the Evangelist, 
Death. 



460 



SECRETS OF A RIVER. 



Last year, the number of suicides in London amounted to 
1,160, and of this number 415 committed self-destruction by 
drowning. Tlie Thames "Watermen fish many a ghastly body 
from the River, and for each carcass — the result of their terrible 
trolling, they receive three pounds from the City authorities. 





CHAPTER XXXL 

INTO THE JAWS OF DEATH. 

EKY singular is the appearance 
of Leicester square, where are tl\e 
resorts and lodgings of the foreign 
colonists of London. It is the 
dirtiest and darkest square in the 
^^ -^^^^^^^^^^^ city, "vvith the exception of some 

of the fields in the outer suburbs. 
On every side you may behold traces of the foreign element 
which centres here. The people whom you meet in Leicester 
square, if you ask them a question, will be sure to answer you 
in a strange tongue, or else in a strange gibberish of English 
or Continental patois. There is an acre or two of sickly grass 
in the middle of the square which is guarded from the foot- 
steps of pedestrians by a rickety and worn iron railing. In 
the middle of this patch of scanty grass is an equestrian statue 
of one of the Georges on an iron horse, the nose of which 
has been broken or has rotted off, and its appearance is in 
keeping with the buildings that tower all round it. The 
streets leading to and from the square are filled with foreign 
restaurants, and they are narrow and from theni all issue forth 
smells such as the olfactories of a traveler encounter in the 
back slums of Paris or Vienna. 

The buildings are shabby, the windows are shabby, and the 
people sitting at the tables, whom you may sec through the 
dusty windows, rattling dominoes and playing cards at little 
tables, are shabby. Were it not for the statue in the middle 



402 



I>-TO THE JAWS OF DEATH. 



RESTAURAJIOI 

A-iA..- carte: 



of the square, it might he taken for the Gross Platz of a Conti- 
nental town. Houses with strange names rise on every side, 
having signs in their windows of " Hestaurant a la Carte," " Ta- 
ble d'hote a cinq heures," and are passed in quick succession, 
and the linen-drapers and other shopkeepers in the neighbor- 
hood take especial pains to inform all the passers-by that their 
employees can speak Gennan, French, and Italian, and occa- 
sionally Spanish or Portuguese. 

The loungers in the square give "visible and olfactorj' demon- 
stration that they are 
not Cockneys ; their tan- 
ned skins, long moustach- 
ios, military coats, and 
brigand-like hats, their 
piilite and impressive 
bows, — all show the 
Frenchman, the Span- 
iard, the Polish exile, 
the Italian revolutionist, 
and the Greek wine mer- 
chant. The mingled 
fumes of tobacco and 
garlic, the peddlers who 
make desperate attempts 
to sell you copies of the 
Internationale, Patrie, 
Journal Pour Pire, and 
Piritto, all give ample 
evidence that you are in 
a strange quarter of Lon- 
don, The lodging-houses here are on the Parisian plan, and 
are let at five to ten shillings a week to mysterious men, who 
rise late, and arc away all day in the cafes or gaming-houses to 
come home singing operatic airs at a late hour of the morning. 
Polish exiles, Italian siqxjrnumeraries of the opera, French 
figurantes of the inferior grades, GeiTiian musicians, teachers 
and translators of languages, toutei-s for gambling-dens — all 




FOREIGN CAFE IK COVENTRY STEEET. 



\ 



LEICESTER SQU^VEE. 463 

congregate Iicre. This is tlieir Arcadia — their place of meet- 
ing, eating, drinking and sleeping — and for a hundred years 
past it has been frequented by such parasites. 

Here m tliis veiy scpiare in one of the houses which form 
the "Hotel Sabloniere," lived Peter the Great and his boon 
companion, the Marquis of Carmaerthen ; and in this square 
they have reeled home night after night ; the master of all the 
Russias half-c-nizy with his potations of strong brandy and red 
pepper, of which he was passionately fond. Up yonder stairs 
passed Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, in her powder, hoops, 
and patches, licr train glistening under the glaiing lights of 
the link boys who preceded her sedan chair, to the wedding 
of John Spencer, first Earl Spencer, and Miss Poyntz — bearing 
a case of jewels valued at £100,000, and a pair of shoe buckles 
valued at £30,000, ior presentation to the beautiful bride. 

The old-fashioned house opposite was the abode of Sir 
Joshua Ecynolds, and the one at the corner of Sydney's Alley 
was the residence of "William Hogarth, the bitterest and yet 
the truest caricaturist of his day. Here nightly came Samuel 
Johnson with his huge bulk and big walking-stick, to dogma- 
tize with Reynolds, and with him came his toady, Boswell ; 
and here came Goldsmith to read his "Deserted Village" 
to his coterie of choice spirits — and here Frederick, the 
" Good Prince of Wales," as he has been called to distinguish 
him from all the rest of his title, came to die of a bad cold 
which he caught walking in Kew Gardens in 1751 ; and here 
resided John Hunter, in the house now occupied by a hmnbug 
keeping a Turkish bath. It is a place of strange, quaint mem- 
ories of good and brave, base and ignoble men and women 
in the past ; it is now the Alcedama of licensed vice, the fes- 
tering spot of all London. 

It is now a place where wantons expose their shame ; where 
social rottenness, winked at by the authorities, eats at the heart 
of a people who publish and read books condenming the de- 
pra-s-ity of Paris; who, in a pharisaical way, talk of the Mabille 
and the Quartier Breda, and yet in this very square is the 
" Royal Alhambra Palace," as it is called in the huge colored 



464 INTO THE JAWS OF DEATH. 

posters ; and in the daily advertisements in all of the morning 
and evening papers of the metropolis, you may read such no- 
tices as these : 

" The Alhambra— This evening at 8 o'clock, ' Pierrot,' the 
grand ballet, by Mr, Harry Boleno and troupe. 

" The Alhambra — At 9 o'clock, the Christy Minstrels, by 
Kiviere. 

" The Alhambra — At 10 o'clock, the magnificent spectacidar 
ballet, ' The Spirit of the Deep ;' 10:15, Pitteri, the graceful 
and world-renowned danseuse, in a new grand pas seul ; 10:30, 
'The Home of the Naiads;' 11:15, grand Spanish ballet, 
'Pepita.' 'God Save the Queen' at 11:45. Prices: Prom- 
enade, Is.; stall and balcony, 2s.; gallery, 6d. ; reserved seats, 
4s. ; new tier of private boxes, 2 guineas, 31s. Gd., and 21s. 
Closes at 12." 

It was a rainy, unpleasant night — such a night as is often 
met with in London — when I first paid a visit to the Alhambra. 
The streets were deserted, and few persons were out of their 
houses, and those who were out took to cover in the cabs, 
which went madly dashing by, or in the busses, with their ad- 
vertising signs, that were visible as they passed a lamp — the 
horses steaming and sweating, and the passengers inside 
grumbling and cursing their luck because of the bad air within 
and M'orse weather witliout. 

Nothing in the streets looked pleasant or cheerful, excepting 
the windows of the gin-shops with their briglit brass and metal 
pumps, and the gaudy placards giving a list of the beverages for 
sale in the "publics," where men and women of the himibler 
class were consuming large quantities of beer and spirits. Pass- 
ing through the Hay market, I went down Coventry street, and 
in a few minutes stood before the gorgeous, gilded fa9ade of the 
Alhambra. The building is about five stories high, painted of a 
cream-color, with minarets and gilt vanes and turrets in imi- 
tation of the manner of Owen Jones. The attempt to copy the 
Moresco style is rather absurd in the midst of common-place 
London. Indeed, it would be hard to find a Court of Lions 
in the building, and those who look for that most beautifid 



THE KOYAL ALUA:HIJKA PALACE. 465 

feature of the real Allianibra will go away disappointed. There 
is, however, a Court of Female Tigresses in the gallery up 
stairs which wull compensate the curious for the absence of the 
Court of Lions. Though the streets were deserted, a large 
number of cabs stood at the front of the building and crowds 
of people were getting in and getting out of them. 

The moon peeped just then from a bank of cloud, its 
rays breaking over the disfigured statue in the square, and 
threw a faint dead glare on the flaunting women wdio filled the 
passage leading to the Alhambra ; the lielmeted policemen ; the 
porters in their black caps trimmed with red bands ; the noisy, 
swearing cabmen disputing about their lares ; the horses 
champing and biting, and the beggar boys and match-women 
who solicited languid swells to purchase their wares. It is the 
custom to give a penny to the men or boys who eagerly rush 
to open the door of your cab, and should you neglect them, 
they will follow until by wearying you they have achieved 
their object. There was a little hole in the wall, and a counter 
or desk, behind which was a sharp-looking young man, whose 
face seemed hard and cynical under the glare of the gas-jet 
over his head. Handing this man a shilling, I received a huge 
circular piece of tin, with a hole and letters punched in its sur- 
face. This was the ticket of admission, which I surrendered 
at the door to a big man in a red uniform, who looked like a 
Life Guardsman, liis breast being all covered with service 
medals, but for what service I could not tell, or where per- 
formed. 

Passing a wooden barrier, I caught a glimpse of liglits, a 
stage, and legs of ballet-girls — a noise of many voices came by 
my ears, a number of young ladies smoking cigarettes opened 
a way for me to pass, and I stood inside of the Alhambra. I 
found myself in the promenade, which encircled the ground 
floor of the house, leaving a large space which was railed in for 
the wives and families of decent people wdio wanted to hear 
the music and see the dancing and pantomime. To walk in 
and around the promenade costs one shilling. To go inside of 
the railing in the space — wdiich corresponds with the parquette 



'466 



INTO THE JAWS OF DEATH. 



at Niblo's, only that tlie wliole floor is level and there is no de- 
scent here — will cost another sliillinij. 

I saA' a bar and a bar-maid before I got actually into the 
place from whence the stage could be seen ; there was a bar and 
three bar-maids half-way down the promenade, and there w'as 
a bar and two bar-maids down before me in tlie alcove leading 
to the Canteen, with a corresponding number of bars and bar- 
maids in the same positions on the other side of the house. 

All these bars had splendid bottles, with various fluids in 
them, arranged with an eye to effect, making it look like a vast 
apothecary's window, and there were bright brass beer-pumps 
all in a row, and pewter and silver and metal pots and tank- 
ards, and oval glass frames with pies, sandwiches, and all kinds 
of lunches to satisfy the thirst and appetites of the audience. 
The promenade was choked with men and women, walking 
past each other, looking at the stage, drinking at the bars, 
chafiing each other in a rough way, and laughing loudly. Al- 
though the night was stormy without, the revelry was high 
within. 

Perhaps in this audience of three thousand people, who filled 
the ground floor and galleries, standing and sitting, and eating 
and drinking, there might have been fifteen hundred women, 
all well, and many of them fashionably, dressed and gloved. A 
sergeant of police with me said : 

" If there are 1,500 women here to-night, as I believe there 
are, you may be sure that there are 1,200 women of the town 
among that nundjer, Sir." 

Twelve hundred unfortunate women in one place of amuse- 
ment — and half a dozen other places like this, but of an inferior 
class, are open tliis rainy, unpleasant night, with a like com- 
plement of wretched females recklessly passing the hours that 
intervene before the dens close at midnight. The crash of 
sixty pieces of fine nnisic falls on the ear, the glare, the gas, 
the tinsel on the stage, the well-dressed, fine-fticed women 
around cannot shut out my thoughts of the " Legion of the 
Lost " who are so merry, so thoughtless, so careless of the mor- 
row—deep in the fallacies of sin and despair. 



THE SOCL^L EVIL. 467 

The men who are conversing with these women seem to be 
of a good class, and spend a good deal of money in refresh- 
ments and licpor upon their fair, frail acquaintances. These 
last are not allowed to go inside of the railing on the ground floor 
alone, but they do not care for that privilege, as there is plenty 
to drink outside and more of the company of the male gender. 
Whenever a woman on the stage capers more vigorously, or 
flings her leg higher than the others, the applause is loud, 
long, and continued, and pewter and metal pots are dented in 
the surfaces of the tables that are ranged before each red- 
cushioned seat. 

The comic singers are the favorites of the audience, however, 
and are always encored with vociferous enthusiasm. These 
singers get in a place like the Alhambra as much as ten pounds 
a week, as the proprietors know well the value of their services. 
The pantomimes are of the very best kind I ever saw ; the 
dancing is, of its kind, good ; the orchestra excellent and full 
in numbers, the acrobatic performances very flne, and the 
picture at tne close of the pantomime is really superb. Yet 
with all these excellences combined, if the Alhambra and every 
Music-IIall-IIell like it in London were suddenly scorched up 
by a fire from Heaven, it would be the most incomparable 
benefit ever bestowed upon the English metropolis, and a 
saving grace to thousands of young English men and women 
— both in body and soul. 

And the reason for this is that women are allowed admission 
at the door on payment of the price, without the escort of a 
man. Consequently it is, with the exception of the Argyle, 
and Ilolborn Casino, the greatest place of infamy in all London. 
It is convenient, in a central location, and were women not ad- 
mitted alone the business of the place woidd break up. The 
men under twenty -five years of age, who comprise tlic largest 
part of the male audience, would not come were these For- 
mosas debarred from admission. The performance — a first- 
class one — is not heeded. The chief attraction is the women. 

And are these women calcidated, by their manner, dress or 
appearance, to shock or warn people by their degradation? 
29 



468 INTO TUE JAWS OF DEATU. 

On the contrary tliey are cheerful, pleasant-looking girls, of 
quite fair breeding, and of a far better taste in their dress than 
the honest wives and sweethearts of the mechanics and shop- 
keepers, who sit in the place of virtue, within the painted rail- 
ing. These women are satisfied with their lot, and do not re- 
pine so long as they have male acquaintances or " friends," as 
they call them, to give them champagne, moselle, and late sup- 
pers of game and native oysters in the Cafe de TEurope, or at 
Barnes's in the Ilaymarket. Despite the arguments of those 
who have sought to eradicate the evil, these women, to any 
great number, never forsake their calling for the life of an hon- 
est working- woman. They laugh at such an idea, and will tell 
you that they could not do without wine, rich food, and costly 
dresses, even at the fearful price they have given to obtain 
them. 

Besides, there is no field open to them, and suspicion fol- 
lows every effort for reformation made by the few who have 
left the life of prostitution to go to hard Avork or service. 
They look down npon shoj^-girls and bar-maids with contempt, 
and many of them keep servants from the gains of their infa- 
my. Whenever one of these girls happens to notice a stranger 
who does not seem to know the place, she will not hesitate to 
walk up to him, take his arm, and ask him : " Come, won't 
you give me my liquor ?" 

Many of these women have had no education whatever ; still 
they manage to conceal the fact as much as possible, while 
others will tell you that they came originally from the work- 
house, where they were sent as children, and being thrown on 
the streets when grown up, had no means of making a living 
but that which they were compelled to adopt. I spoke to one 
ladylike girl who seemed to be rather abstracted, and asked her 
if she were not tired of her present life, and anxious to leave it. 

"Tired of my life? You may believe it that I am; but 
what of that. No one would take me by the hand after leav- 
ing this life. I am not such a fool as to jump frojn the frying 
pan into the fire. I get tight about twice a week, and then I 
come here and talk and drink more, and that serves to pass 



"WOTTEN WOW." 469 

away the time. My friend is in Paris, and he sends me money 
when I want it. My mother is dead and my fatlier is in 
America. I don't know where, and I don't care much, for he 
never bothered himself about me. Are you going to treat ? " 

I saw this girl walk up to the bar ten minutes after, pushing 
her way through the crowd, and saw her toss oif nearly half a 
pint of raw gin, or " gin neat," as it is called here, without 
winking. Such is life. The detective told me that the girl 
had been one of the flashiest and best-dressed women who vis- 
ited the Alhambra until a few months before, when she began 
drinking, and rapidly descended, when she had to pawn all her 
jewelry. 

The songs sung in the Alhambra are not quite as low as 
those heard in some of the nmsic-halls, and chiefly derive their 
short popularity from the fact that there is a comic vein in each 
one. Sentimental songs are not so popular, and do not receive 
so many encores as the comic ones. A man came on the stage, 
dressed in the exaggerated costume of a Pall Mall lounger, who 
sang a song, of wliich the following is a verse, vdth a very af- 
fected voice and lisp, keeping his body bent in a painful posi- 
tion the while : 

THE BEAU OF WOTTEN WOW. 

Now evewy sumwali's day 

I always pass my time away ; 

Arm in arm with, fwiends I go, 

And stwoU awound sweet Wotten Wow ; 

For that's the place, none can deny. 

To see blooming faces and laughing eye ; 

And if your hawts with love would glow, 

Why, patwonize sweet Wotten Wow. 
Chorus : 
So come young gents and dont be slow, 
But stylish dwess and each day go. 
And view the beauties to and fwo, 
Who dwive and wide wound Wotten Wow. 

The chief merit in the singing of this song to the audience — 
was the affected lisp and farcical airs of the singer, who did his 
best to imitate the swells who lean over the railings in Rotten 
Pow, when that fishionable drive is crowded with equestrians 



4T0 INTO THE JAWS OF DEATH. 

and foot passengers in the regular London season. The mob 
liked the satire on the aristocrats and relished all the local hits 
of the speech and the dress of the ideal do-nothing. Some- 
thing of a more grotesque nature, and more broadly funny, 
which was cheered to the echo, was a nonsensical song called 
the "Eoyal Beast Show," that seemed to please the men and 
women in the audience. This song was sung by a man in a 
l)lood-red scarf, a pea-green body coat, and green glass goggles. 
Tlie costume was indicative of nothing under heaven or earth 
that I ever saw before, but the song was exactly suited to the 
comprehension of the people, as their shouts of laughter tes- 
tified : 

THE r.OTAL BEAST SHOW. 

Come, stand aside, g-ood people all, and liear vot I've got to say. 
But let the little dears come liup, 'wot's going' for to pay. 
At all tlie coorts in Europe, we are reckoned quite tlie go : 
Then pay yer sixpences, and see the Royal Wild Beast Show. 

Chorus. 
The cammomiles, the crockodiles, and all that you could wish ; 
The mice and rats, and tabby cats, and other kinds of fish ; 
A dozen sjjhinxes hu[)side down and standing hin a row ; 
Hits only sixpence heach to see the Royal Wild Beast Show. 

The first one is the Kangaroo, you ought to see hint jump ; 
The next one is the Ippopotvmus, you ought to see 'is hump ; 
The third one is the Ilalligator, and he's such a one to crow. 
He wakes hns hevery morning in the Royal Wild Beast Show. 

The Donkey in the comer, with the Tiger hon 'is harm. 
Comes from Ilass-iriya, vere once his father kept a farm ; 
That Billy-Goat that's dressed in Pink and valking rayther slow. 
He's werj' iZarn-iraental in a Royal Wild Beast show. 

The cammomiles, <S:c. 

After these choice ballads had been sung, there was a ballet 
in which about fifty young ladies capered and pranced in a 
Bower of Angels, with a lot of dolphins, just like dolphins and 
angels in their nnttual festivities in the other world : and then 
the detective who accompanied me, said : 

" Would you like to see the Canteen ? That's a werry 'igh 
old game is tlie Canteen; sort of priveet like." 



IN THE C-V]S"rEEN. 



471 



The Canteen of the Alhambra is sitimted on the lo\vcr floor 
of the building, under the stage, and has a dark entrance 
througli a door whicli is supported on swinging hinges. The 
descent is by a spiral flight of stone steps, and on going 
through this door, the stranger receives the idea that he is 
going behind the scenes, Avhich is a great niistalce. The pro- 
prietors have made the entrance as dark and mysterious as 
possible, in order to throw a kind of green-room air about it, 
which captivates simple people, and induces them to spend 




CANTEEN OP THE AXJIAHBKA. 



more money than they would otherwise. It is, in fact (this 
Canteen), nothing more than a subterranean bar-room, where 
men treat to Champagne wine and Moselle cup, the ballet-girls 
who come down, wrapped in travelling-cloaks; and after 
each ballet is concluded, flirt, drink, and make eligible ac- 
quaintances. The bar is in the form of a half circle, and two 
very lai-gely framed women were behind it this night, serving 



472 INTO TOE JAWS OF PKATII. 

the customers, wlio sit around on wooden benches. Tlie ceil- 
ing is supported l)y nide posts, and everything is as uncouth 
as possible ; and this gives it an additional charm to country- 
men. They feel that they are doing something sinful, some- 
thing indiscreet, which they would not like to have their 
wives or relations hear of, and, with the natural pen^ersity of 
human nature, it is enjoyable to a corresponding degree. The 
waiters who bring the drinks and cigars from the bar, wear 
black dress-coats and red plush waist coats. 

"When I descended to the Canteen, the ballet was still on 
above us, and I could hear the tramping of the feet of the 
dancers as they boimded to and fro on the stage boards over 
my head. There were no Ijallet girls in the Canteen, but in a 
few minutes the strains of the dance music died away and 
down came the coryphees, trooping by twos and threes, their 
faces painted and chalked, and their white slippers and tights 
peeping out from the bottoms of the gray wateqjroof cloaks 
which they wore. They took their seats in the room on the 
wooden benches, and it was not long until each ballet 
girl found her male affinity, and of course the male affinity 
treated her to whatever the dear creature called for — however 
expensive. In such a moment, when these angels in tissue 
condescend to talk to mortals, Avho could think of expense. 

There were a number of soldiers in the room, wearing the 
unifonns of different regiments, chiefly of the Household 
troops, with here and there a line private in buff and blue; a 
rifleman in dark green, or an artilleryman, with his gorgeous 
red facings and trinmiings. But the angels of the ballet never 
wasted their time on such low people as common soldiei-s. 
Their game was much higher, and if they could not get a 
drink from an officer holding her Majesty's commission, they 
were content with stray Americans, who have a reputation 
for reckless liberality. In tact, Americans rank above par in 
the Canteen market, and are received with due honor. 

I saw one old gentleman, fully six feet high, with a venera- 
ble face and white whiskers, evidently of a respectable position 
in society, with his arm around the chalked neck of a girl of 



THE OLD SINNEE. 



473 



fifteen, wliose liglit brown curls fell in masses over lier should- 
ers, and, while he talked with her, he supplied her quiclvly- 
emptied glass with a sparkling wine. The detective said, in 
explanation of the scene, to me : 

"You see, sir, these gals as is down here in the Canteen 
only gets ten to sixteen shillin' a M'eek for their night's work, 
and that isn't much. They 
is only the figurantys, and 
can't dance a bit ; but they 
gets a bad foshion from 
the swells vrho go l)ehind 
the scenes a drinkin' cham- 
pagne and sich like, and 
that fashion leads them to 
wuss nor hannything that 
you'll see 'ere. They 
comes down here and 
drinks between the bailey, 
and then goes hup on to 
the stage and dances again, 
and comes down hagain 
after the next bailey, and 
by the time the Alhambra 
closes they are so blessed 
tight that they are ready for hanythink. I means, of course, 
the gals as is innocent yet ; but the old hands are weriy know- 
in' cards, so they is, bless you." 

" That little gal as is just now a takin' that gentleman's address 
is a werry downy gal, she is. They calls her the ' Daisy,' be- 
cause she has a fondness for bokays, and she is hup to all sorts 
of games. She 'ad some kind of a heddykation, when she was 
a little gal, and I thinks she was a governess or sich like once, 
and went to the dogs through somebody's feult; and she 
writes a beautiful hand, she does, and her little game is to send 
letters to strangers who visit London for the first time and 
don't know what to do with their money, and full of aflckshun 
and such gammon — and tells tlieni in the writiii' as 'ow she 




THE OLD SINNER. 



474 INTO TIIK .T.UVS OF DKATH. 

seed better days and axes their parding for givin' so nrncla 
trouble — and 'opes tliey won't tliink tlie avuss of lier for such 
freedom or liberty ; and tlien slie gets a few pun from the 
spooney, and she goes on a habsolutely hawful drunk for a few 
days and doesn't come to the rehearsal — and when the money 
is all spent she writes more letters and 'umbugs some other 
sjDOon. Oh, she is werry deep, is the ' Daisy.' " 

The " Tulip," the other young girl, according to the story 
of the policeman, was fomous for her aptitude in swearing and 
drinking " Stout "; otherwise there was nothing of special interest 
in her character, and her face, though a pretty one, was strongly 
marked Math lines of dissipation. By the time that I was 
ready to leave the Canteen, having seen all that was worth 
seeing in the den (for it is a den, and nothing else) which has 
been the cause of many a promising youth's ruin, it was nearly 
eleven o'clock. 

"We paid another shilling to go up in the " Gallery," where 
there is not the slightest disguise in the conduct of the females 
who throng the place. Back of the gallery, in the corridors, 
where the performance can be seen over the heads of the men 
who stand in front, are ranged a number of bars, and at each 
end of this place, which forms a kind of saloon, small tables 
with marble tops. At these tables a number of men and wo- 
men sat and drank and laughed, and told each other anecdotes 
more pointed than polished in their application. The clamor 
and the smoke made the place unbearable, and the strains of 
music from the orchestra, playing "Weber's "Last "Waltz," 
filled the vast building with its circular galleries, that were 
heaped one upon another, to the ceiling. Up in the highest 
gallery of all, where the admittance is only sixpence, the riff- 
raif were collected. "When a woman goes to the sixpenny 
gallery in the Alhambra she is indeed lost beyond all hope 
of rescue. 

I came down disgusted, and on going below stairs to the first 
tier I found there a kid glove, fan, and bouquet stand. It is the 
fashion for the young men of this pious city of London, who 
have more money than brains, when they visit the Alhambra, 



THE SIX PENNY GALLERY. 475 

to buy kid gloves or fans for tlie unfortunates wlio throng tlie 
place. Quite a trade is done in this way, as some of the swells 
are not satisfied, when intoxicated, unless they can prevail up- 
on their feminine friends to accept of a slight trifle of their es- 
teem in the shape of a dozen pairs of fine kids in a gilt box. 
The man at the glove stand told me that business in the sea- 
son — when people came home from the Continent — was very 
brisk, and he said that in one night he had sold as many as 
nineteen dozen kids to be presented to the Formosas of the 
place. 

The detective said to me as we went down stairs: " Suppose 
we go to the Argyle, in the 'Aymarket, and then finish with 
the Casino and Barnes's ; they'll be very lively just now, I -war- 
rant ye, and the fun grows furious near midnight." I assented 
to this proposal, and we took a cab and went to the Argyle 
Kooms. The cabby put his tongue in his cheek when I said 
"Argyle Hooms," and drove us there. I gave him eigliteen 
pence, and he desired to know if I didn't want to borrow the 
price of admission, because I refused to give him half a crown 
for a ride of a thousand feet. 




CHAPTER XXXII. 




THE"ARQYLE," "BARNES'S," AND "CASINO." 

T is a quarter past eleven o'clock and the Hay- 
market is full of people — men and women 
jostling each other, many of both sexes being 
intoxicated; and beggars solicit us at every 
crossing, doffing their greasy caps and thrust- 
ing their dirty paws under our noses in their 
persistency. The cafes are overflowing with 
Gauls from across the channel, and when the 
crowds become too thick to leave the side- 
walks passable, the policemen, who are in great numbers here, 
have to interfere to quell rows every few minutes. They clear 
the streets in a mild, civil way, very different from the man- 
ner of the New York police in like contingencies. 

A stranger cannot help being astonished at the vast, almost 
incalculable, number of unfortunate women who haunt the 
London streets in this quarter as the hour of midnight ap- 
proaches. There must be a great rottenness in Demnark 
where such a state of things can exist, and exist without any 
surprise on the part of those who witness such scenes nightly. 
I paid a shilling to enter the Argyle Rooms, and received a 
tin check, which was given up at the door, as in the Alham- 
bra. The Argyle lias not such liigh architectural pretensions 
as the Alhambra, but the class of visitors are better in the 
sense of dress and position. I entered through a side door, 
and found myself in a carpeted room, handsomely and taste- 
fiilly furnished and decorated. 



THE "akgyle eooms." 47T 

1 

The saloon is nearly as large as Irving Hall, in Xew York,' 
bnt lit up in a splendid manner with handsome chandeliers, 
which depend from the lofty ceiling, the gas jets burning in a 
deep glow through the shining metal stalactites that ornament 
the chandeliers. A splenchd band of fifty instruments is sta- 
tioned in the gallery at the further end of the room, and the 
nmsic is of the best kind. The leader is attired in full even- 
ing dress, as is also every fiddler in the band, and the wave of 
the chefs baton is as graceful as that of Julien, wlien he was 
in his prime. "Women, dressed in co: tly silks and satins and 
velvets, the majority of them wearing rich jewels and gold or- 
naments, are lounging on the plush sofas in a free and easy 
way, conversing with men whose dress betoken that they are 
in respectable society. A number of these arc in full evening 
dress, wearing their overcoats, and a few of them have come 
from the clubs, a few from dinnerparties, and a greater number 
from the theatres or opera. 

They are not ashamed to be seen here by their acquaint- 
ances — far from it ; they think this is a nice and clever thing 
to do, and, as no virtuous woman ever enters this place, there is 
no danger of meeting those who own a sisterly or still dearer 
tie, and who might cause a blush to redden the cheeks of 
these charming young men. Across the lower end of the room 
an iron railing is stretched, and tliis keeps the vulgar herd 
from mingling with the elite of the abandoned women who 
frecpient the Argyle. Three-fourths of the ground space is de- 
voted to dancing, and inside this railing sets are formed at a 
signal from the band above. 

The charge for admission below, where I stand with the de- 
tective surveying this strange scene, is but a shilling, while tlie 
entrance fee to the gallery is two shillings, and this admits, as 
I am told by a servant, to all the privileges of the place what- 
ever they may be. Even in vice the '' horrid spirit of caste " pre- 
vails. It is chiefly clerks and tradesmen who are dancing in 
the shilling place, and at the end of each dance, be it waltz or 
quadrille, the man who has danced is expected to refresh his 
partner with a copious draught of beer, or a glass of plain gin. 



4:78 THE "AJBGYLE," "bAIINES's," AND " CASINO. 



5? 



These ^roinen all take their gin without water, and smoke 
cigarettes if some one will pay for them. Inside the railing it 
is different. 

The bars here are furnished with great splendor, and the 
calls for champagne are incessant. The women call cham- 
pagne " fizz," and ale " swill." All around the room cush- 
ioned seats or benches are placed so that those who ha\'e done 
dancing may rest themselves and drink. There are liquor 
counters in every corner of the room, and a good, business is 
done, the bar-maids being kept actively employed all the time 
while the music is pla^^ing. Upstairs there is another galleiy 
and a fine bar, and here the really fast women congregate, 
to look over the balconies, but never condescending to mix 
among the ^'ulgar dancers, excepting when their reason is 
gone through intoxication. These women all carry ex- 
pensive fans, and their trains are as long as the train of a Count- 
ess in a reception at St. James's. There is a handsomely 
fitted up alcove to the right of the bar, and this alcove is or- 
namented with panels, on which are painted such ]uctures as 
"Europaand the Bull," " Leda," "Bacchus and Silenus;" 
and here are a number of \vomen and men with Venetian gol> 
lets foaming full of champagne before them. Standing at the 
entrance to the alcove, is a stout, florid-faced woman, ^'ulgar in 
ajipcarance, with incipient moustachios at the corners of lier 
lips. She is covered with jewelry, and her fingers, fat, red, 
and unshapely, glitter with diamonds. 

This is the famous " Kate Hamilton," who was at one time 
the reigning beauty of her class, aiid has now degenerated into 
a vile pander. She is surrounded by a cluster of gn-Js, and 
they are all in an animated discussion with her. The detective 
introduces me to this famous, or rather infamous, Messalina, 
and her first question is, " Will you stand some ' Sham V '' 
The next is to make inquiry about a number of New York 
politicians and sporting men who have patronized her den, 
somewhere in the Ilaymarket, while doing the foreign tour. 
She is most business-like and brief, this fetid old wretch, and 
has a speaking acquaintance with every man in the saloon. 



THE IIAYMAKKET BY XIGIIT. 479 

"Wliile we are standing looking at her and her fiicnds, tlie 
room is darkened, the gas being ahnost extinguished, and a chemi- 
cal, light-colored flame irradiates the room like a twilight at 
sea, and the entire female population rush below to join in the 
last, wild, mad shadow-dance of the night. Around and around 
tliej go in each other's arms, whirling in the dim, uncertain, 
gmvejard light, these unclean things of the darkness, shout- 
ing and shrieking, totally lost to shame — their gestures wanton 
as the movements of an Egyptian Alniee and mad as the ca- 
pers of a dancing dervish. Then the hall is darkened, the 
band ceases playing, the waiters finish the remains of the un- 
corked champagne bottles, the women dash madly down the 
carpeted stairs and into the streets with their male companions, 
and are whirled away with the cabs, which wait in long rows 
before the entrance of the Argyle, to the purlieus of Pimlico 
and the sensual shades of St. John's Wood, at Brompton. 

The night has closed, a full English moon floats silently in 
the hea^-cns, white snowy powder hangs over our heads like a 
film of lace — the clock-tower at Westminster Palace booms out 
the hour of midnight over the dark sui-fiice of the Thames, and 
we escape from the bustle of that vile dancing hall with glad- 
ness. 

"Xow," said my conductor, "let's go down in the Ilay- 
market to Barnes's, and look at that for a few minutes, and 
then we will go to the Casino, in the Holborn, for a finish, if 
you please, sir." 

Down through Coventiy street, past the cafes again, which 
arc preparing to close, and now we are in the Ilaymarket, one 
of the worst quarters of London. This street is wide, begin- 
ning at Coventiy street and running down for a distance of 
about 1,400 feet to the "bottom," ending at the line where 
Pall Mall begins. They always say the " bottom " or " top " 
of a street in London, never "east" or "west." If there be 
a place in London that is deserving of notice, it is the Hay- 
market. Hundreds of years ago, the washerwomen of the vil- 
lage of Charing, just below us, and now one of the great busi- 
ness centres of London, used to bring their dirty linen here 



480 THE "akgyle," "baenes's," and "casino." , 

to cleanse it, and then dry it ou the green fields in the 
Ilaymarket. 

The green fields of the Ilaymarket have long ago been cov- 
ered over with theatres, opera-houses and palatial shops, and 
now not all the washerwomen in England conld cleanse the 
immoral sewage that streams through the Ilaymarket night 
after night — through the snows of winter, the heated nights 
of July, and August, and the fragrance of May. Here, at this 
chemist's door, formerly a tennis court, Charles II., his 
brother, the Duke of York, Sedley, Kochester, and the rest of 
the wild, reckless lot, used to come to play their favorite game ; 
and here sat Mistress Gwynne, Portsmouth, Mrs. Hyde, 
Louise de Queroailles, Frances Stewart, and other dissolute 
beauties of the merry monarch's court, applauding the feats of 
skill performed by their lovers. In tlie theatre formerly stand- 
ing on the site of the present Ilaymarket Theatre, and 
opposite to Her Majesty's Opera House, with its long, drab 
colonnades and dark shops imbedded in the arcades, Foote 
and glorious Garrick woke the passions of all who were intel- 
lectual and noble in the Addisonian age of England. 

Here was the public house kept by Broughton, tlie cham- 
pion of England, who has been forever immortalized by Ho- 
garth — just off Cockspur street ; and here was liis swinging 
sign-board, having a portrait of himself, battered and bruised, 
in a cocked hat and wig, witli the legend on the sign-board — 

" Hie Victor CsBstus artemque repono." 

Think of a modern prize buffer attempting to quote from 
the classics. Gibber wi*ote a show-bill for Broughton once, 
which I reproduce, as a specimen of advertising skill : 

"At The New Theatre 

"In the Haii'market, ox WEnxESDAY. The 29th of This 

Inst^vnt Ai»ril, 

"The Beauty of the Science of Defence will be sho'wm in a 

Trial of Skill between the following Masters, "viz.. Whereas, 

there was a battle fought on the ISth of March last, between 



AT "baknes's." 481 

Mr. Jolmson, from Yorkshire, and Mr. Sherlock, from Ire- 
land, in which engagement they came so near as to throw each 
other down. Since that rough battle the said Sherlock has 
challenged Johnson to fight him, strapt down to the stage, for 
twenty ponnds ; to which the said Johnson has agreed ; and 
they are to meet at the time and place above mentioned, and 
fight in the following manner, A'iz., to have their left feet 
strapt down to the stage, within reach of each other's right 
leg; and the most bleeding wounds to decide the wager. 
N. B. — The undaunted young James, who is thought the 
bravest of his age in the manly art of boxing, fights himself 
the stout-hearted George Gray for ten pounds, who values 
himself for fighting at Tottenham Court. Attendance to be 
given at ten, and the Jfasters mount at twelve. Cudgel-play- 
ing and boxing to divert the gentlemen until the battle begins. 

"]S^. B. — Frenchmen are requested to bring smellmg 
bottles." 

Think only of these wigged nobles and their clients, the 
boxers, in knee-breeches and wigs, going to a battle, and think 
of the Frenchmen who were compellled to bring smelling-bot- 
tles to keep their stomachs in order, and who will not say that 
eA'en in prize-fighting the Nineteenth century has brought pro- 
gress, as in every other scientific matter ? 

We are now at Barnes's, a famons night house, or, rather, 
an infamous night house, in the Haymarket. When the dai\cing 
places and music-hells of the metropolis close, this door remains 
open to catch all stray night birds who can find no other rest- 
ing place. The place is an ordinary drinking saloon, with a 
confectionery and pastry counter, and the attendants are five 
or six over-dressed young ladies, all of whom have their hair 
dyed of a light color, and are very free and chatty in their 
manner. These girls are well supplied with jewelry and lock- 
ets. Their salary is not large enough to furnish them with 
the trinkets, as they only get one pound five shillings a week ; 
yet they manage to dress expensively, and Champagne is so 
common to their palates that they have become indiftcrent to 
it and it absolutely palls upon them. Yet there is a percent- 



4S2 THE "akgyle," "eaiines's," a^d "casino." 

age on every bottle tliat is coiisuined here, and consequently' 
they do tlieir best to sell Moet Sz Chandon at ten shillings a' 
bottle to the customers — and will even drink with them. 

This is a great place for rump-steaks and nati\'c oysters — ' 
late at night, and a good business is done here in those articles of 
food. The oysters are small, black, and have a bitter, copper- 
ish taste. A New Yorker, used to Sounds and East Elvers, j 
would leave them in disgust ; but Englishmen, whose throats 
are parched with the liquoi's they get at the Argyle and in 
the Hay market, prefer them to the most luscious Saddle Rocks.' 
There is a large screen in the center of the room, the bar glit- 
ters with costly mirrors, and behind the screen are a number 
of small boxes partitioned off, and having red plush seats. In 
these are several noisy women, inflamed with liquor, eating 
and drinking and hallooing at their male companions. One girl, 




IN TUE UATilAl UhT 



in a black silk dress, with her hair hanging down in disorder, is 
crying drunk at one of the tables, and has just spilled a bottle of 
wine over her handsome dress. She is cui-sing the waiter, 
who is also drunk, with much earnestness of puqx)se, and as 
soon as she sees the detective she halloos at him in a harsh 
voice : 



THE "lIOLBOEN CASINO." 483 

" I say, Bobby, you don't want me, do you ?" I 'avcnt done 
nothink, although I wos wonst in Newgate for taking a swell's 
watch, which he guv to nie for my wedding present, as was 
just four year ago, come Micklemas Goose. I wish I could 
throw meself in the Thames, but I 'aven't got the 'art — 

" 'Hoh, my 'art is in the 'Iglilands 
A follerin the vild roe. 
My 'art is in the 'Iglilands, 
Wheresomdever I — go — I go." 

" All ! that's a rum customer," said the policeman ; " she's 
fly to hevery think. Now, hif that gal ain't watched this 
night, she is jest as likely to go to London Bridge and tlirow 
her blessed body lioff into the dirty water as not. They al- 
ways goes to Lunnun Bridge when they want to make way 
with themselves — it's so lively like." 

" Now," said the policeman, " I would hadv-iso you to make 
the finish at the ' Casino,' in the 'Olborn, afore you go to your 
hotel, sir, and then you may say you've seen the best of the 
bad places of Lunnun. The Casino is hopen till one o'clock 
to-night, I think, and we'll just be in time for the best dance." 

We took a cab again, which dashed up Coventry street, 
through Cranbourne street, into Long acre, and up Drury 
Lane, past the old theatre of that name, and in a few minutes 
we descended in the wide, open space of the Ilolborn, before 
the entrance of the Casino, the fashionable dance-house of Lon- 
don. The street was lined with cabs, and policemen were 
thick in the vicinity of the entrance, ordering the men and 
women just coming out to pass on, and keep the street 
clear, a duty which gained for them a great deal of abuse from 
the intoxicated women, who did not want to pass on by any 
means. The entrance to this place is through a gaudy, gilded 
vestibule and down a descent of four or five steps to a spacious 
marble floor, which was covered with dancers. The whole in- 
terior was gilded, gold leaf and white predominating above all 
other colors. 

The band, as at the other places of e\al resort, was placed in 
30 



4Si THE "aegyle," "baenes's," axd "casesto." 

the fjirtlicst end gallery, and was an excellent one. The 
leader wore white kids and the musicians white vests, and the 
crash of the instniments was almost deafening, filling the large 
space with a wild and not nnpleasing liarmony. Attendants 
in evening dress were on the floor, making up sets and solic- 
iting the habitues of the place to dance with the female part- 
ners, which were easily found for them. A high balcony ran 
all round the hall, which is 100 feet by 75 in dimension, and 
in the corners of the saloon, up and down stairs, were cafc-s and 
refreshment bars, which were crowded with customers. The 
entrance to this place is only one shilling, and the class of visit- 
ors is of a superior kind to those who go to any other dance-' 
house in London. 

The saloon was really a magnificent one, rich and tasteful in 
its decoration, and the women were well and neatly dressed, 
and very quiet and well-behaved in their manner. Every 
woman wore nice gloves, high-heeled boots, and all of them 
had the lace frill or nift* now prevalent in London around 
their necks. They also wore channs and lockets and gold 
watches, and every one was attended by a cavalier. The men 
were smoking cigars and flirting, and a numl)er of foreigners 
were present and danced incessantly, just as they would at the 
Mabille or any Continental garden. In tact, this is the only 
place in London, with the exception of Cremonie Gardens, 
that in any way approaches the mad gaiety of the Mabille. 

Still, there is a certain English decorum observed here, and 
any girl who would get drunk or lift her skirts too high would 
be expelled instantly by the master of ceremonies, assisted by 
the jx)liccmen who are to be found scattered all over the place. 
Some of the girls will go up and ask for partners to dance with 
them, and then, if the latter wish to give them liquor, — well 
and good, but they will not solicit it, because these women af- 
fect the fashionable lady as much as their Hmited resources 
will allow. 

They are generally the mistresses of men of leisure, 
and when the season is at its height a great number of 
men about town may be seen here, as spectators, who come 



GOOD NIGUT. 485 

from the clubs or the Houses of ParKament, bored by the ennui 
of the reading rooms at one pLice, or the prosj speeches of 
members of the other. Some of the men dance with cigars in 
their mouths, and whirl around in such a wild manner as to 
cause collision with the other couples. Occasionally you will 
see two girls waltzing, and men who have sat too long at the 
dinner-table will, once in an evening, get up together and 
dance a " stag dance." But this is not encouraged by the 
master of ceremonies, as the dancing of a pair of male bipeds 
is not calculated to help the business of the place, and it is in- 
stantly suppressed, amid cheers and laughter. 

The music strikes up for the last galop, and there is a rush 
for partners ; the balconies and alcoves and luxurious seats 
and marble tables are deserted, and in a moment everything 
is in a wild hurly-burly and a confusion and uproar ; men and 
women galloping and bounding and yelling to the right, and 
to the left, and as the last crash of the big drum beats on the 
ear the passages and doorways are thronged with the dancers, 
every man crying for a cab to take himself and partner 
somewhere, perhaps they care not where — it is no mat- 
ter ; and now the place is in darkness, and the policemen 
having seen the last of the women leave the doorway, begin 
their patrol duty, whicli will last until day breaks and the stars 
ftill from the London sky, telling them that they are relieved 
from their night's watch. 

The detective shakes hand with and leaves me, he to go 
eastward to Temple Bar, and I to bed in a remote quarter of the 
great Babylon, whose noises and turmoil are now hushed into 
silence, excepting where a solitary street- walker, fomishing 
from hunger, or a drunken pedestrian bars the way, and makes 
the niofht resound with insane shouts. 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 



ST. PAUL'S CATHEDRAL. 




TIE best expression of Protestant Ecclesi- 
astical art in England, and perhaps in 
the world, is manifested in St. Paul's 
Cathedral, London. It is a stupendous 
temple rather than a church, and the reli- 
gious effect is lost in the interior l)y the 
number of tombs erected to admirals, 
ge-nerals, colonels, and other military and 
naval heroes. 

When Nelson ordered the decks of the Victory cleared for 
action at Trafalgar, he cried out to his lieutenant. Hardy : 
" Now for a peerage or Westminster Abbey." 
But Nelson lies in St. Paul's, and the tomb of England's 
greatest soldier — Wellington, is quite near his, under the same 
lofty nave. All the great Cathedrals and Abbies of England 
were built before the Reformation, and, consequently, St. 
Paul's is the best and truest proof of Protestant art in England. 
The yearly revenues of this Cathedral are £23,422. This does 
not include the salaries of the Bishop of London, the Dean of 
St. Paul's, four Canons, a Precentor, a Chancellor, Treasurer, 
Archdeacon of London, Archdeacon of Middlesex, 29 Canons 
who do nothing but draw tlieir salaries, a Diviinty Lecturer, a 
Sub-Dean, 12 Minor Canons, among whom are a Succentor, Sa- 
crist, Gospeller, Epistolar, Librarian, Almoner, and Warden, a 
Commissary, a Registrar and Chapter Clerk, a Deputy Regis- 
trar, a Receiver and Steward, six Yicars, a Choral, and an Organ- 
ist ; five Bishops' Chaplains, an Examining Chaplain, a Chan- 



"NVIIEX KKECTED AND THE AJRCIHTECT. 



4S7 



cellor of the Diocese, a Secretary to the Jlisliop of London, 
and a Registrar to the r>ishop of London at the Cathedral. 
Altogether ahout eighty ecclesiastics who receive salaries from 
the Cathedral, besides a swann of vergers, choristers, and ser- 
vants of all kinds the salaries of whom amonnt to at least 
£50,000 a year. 

Sir Christopher Wren was the architect of St. PanVs, and 
the first stone of the new Cathedral was laid on the site of the 




ST. PAUL 3 CATHEDRAL. 



old St. Paul's (which had been destroyed by fire in IGGG), in 
June 1671, and thirty-nine years atterward, the last stone 
was laid at the top of the lantern in 1710, by the son of Sir 
Christopher "VVren, who had succeeded his father as the archi- 
tect. 

As St. Peter's at Pome is considered to be the chief tem})le of 
Catholic Christendom, so is St. Paul's entitled to hohl the first 
place in Protestant Christendom. The whole expense of rebuild- 



. Paul's. 


St 


Peter's 


Feet. 




Feet. 


. 500 




GG9 


100 




226 


. 180 




395 


223 




442 


108 




139 


330 




432 


110 




14G 


40 




91 


84,025 


227,009 



48S ST. Paul's cathedral. 

ingSt. Paul's ^vas £730,752 2s. 3d. fortlieCatliedral, and £11,202 
Os. Gd. for the stone wall and railings around the Cathedral. The 
architect received a beggarly £200 a year during its construc- 
tion, for his services. The same architect after^'ards designed 
fifty churches to take the place of those burnt doAvn in the 
Great Fire, and they are all standing to-day, I believe. 

The dimensions of St. Paul's as compared with St. Peter's 
at Home, are as follows : 

St. 

Length within .... 

Breadth at entrance .... 
Front without • . . . 

Breadth at cross .... 

Cupola clear .... 

Cupola and lantern high 
Cliurchhigh .... 

Pillars iu front ..... 
Superficial area .... 

The diameter of the gilt ball is 6 feet 2 inches ; the weight 
5,600 lbs., and will contain eight persons ; the M'eight of the 
cross is 3,360 lbs. 

The ground on which the present Cathedral stands has, from 
time immemorial, been sacred to Divine Worship. There was 
a Christian church here as early as the Second centur}', built, as 
it is supposed, by the Eomans, which was destroyed during 
the persecutions of Diocletian, and again rebuilt, and in the 
Sixth century it was desecrated by the Pagan Saxons, who cel- 
ebrated their Heathenish mysteries in the church. 

It was afterwards richly endowed with lordships by Athel- 
stan, Edgar, Ethelred, Canute, and Edward the Confessor. 
The IS'orman barons, when they came, made a raid on the 
property of the church as they did upon everything they saw 
in England, and the Saxon priests, half frightened to death by 
such violence, had their property retm'ned them by Duke 
William, who gave it a charter on his coronation day, cursing 
all those who should molest the property of St. Paul's, and 
blessin<r those who should auf'ment its revenues. 



DESTKUCnON OF OLD ST. PAUl's. 489 

The emimeration of the jewels, and precious stones, and 
gold and silver ornaments presented to St. Paul's by its ysl- 
rious pious benefactors, takes up twenty-eight pages of Dug- 
dale's Monasticon. 

The dimensions of Old St. Paul's in the year 1315 were : 

Feet. 
Length . . • . • . . 690 

Breadth 130 

Height of nave . . " ... 103 

Length of nave . ... * . . 150 

The height of the gilt ball on the top of the dome, (which was 
large enough to hold ten bushels of corn inside) from the 
ground, was 520 feet and it supported a cross, which made 
the entire height to the top of the cross, 534: feet. The area 
occupied by the edifice of Old St. Paul's was three and a half 
acres, one and one-half rood and 6 perches. The walls of the 
present Cathedral are 1,500 feet in circuit, and enclose five- 
eighths of an acre, or about one-fifth of the space of the old 
St. Paul's. In fine, the present Cathedral is in every way in- 
ferior to the old one, and in some places it is very tawdy in 
decoration, while the Old St. Paul's was in many respects a 
finer cathedral than St. Peter's, and twenty feet deeper. 

In 15G1 the steej)le of Old St. Paul's was burnt down, a few 
years after Queen Elizabeth ascended the throne, and it was 
subsequently decided to rebuild the Cathedral, and Inigo Jones, 
a tar superior architect to Wren, was chosen for the task. In 
1G33, Archbishop Laud laid the first stone of Inigo Jones's 
Cathedral, which was destroyed by fire in 1G60. In 10-13 the 
building was finished at an expense of £100,000. This Cathe- 
dral was architecturally and in every way superior to that built 
afterward by Wren, but was as much inferior to the old Cathe- 
dral of the Middle Ages, which Wren sought to improve upon. 

It is believed that modern European Freemasonry was first 
founded among the workmen who were employed in reluiilding 
St, Paul's, from the fact of a number of the stone masons 
meeting together during the work in a social fashion, and from 



490 ST. taul's catiiedk^vl. 

tins casual association it is stated that the Lodge of Antiquity, 
of^-liich Sir Christopher "Wren was Master, originated, the oc- 
casion being the laying of the highest or lantern stone of tlie 
Cathedral in 1710 — and it is stated that from this Lodge of 
Antiquity all tlie other Lodges of modem Europe have sprung. 

The Catliedral contains moniunents to Xelson, who is buried 
in a wooden coffin taken from tlie mainmast of the French 
Admiral's ship captured at the battle of the Nile the very 
same ship in which the boy Casabianca, the Admiral's son, 
" stood on the burning deck, whence all but him had fled." 
Nelson lies close to Wellington, and other illustrious men. 
His coffin is enclosed in a sarcophagus made by order of 
Cardinal Wolsey for Henry YIII. 

AVcllington is buried in the crypt of the Cathedral, in a sar- 
cophagus made of Coniish porphyry, and near him is his old 
subordinate, the Irish Sir Thomas Picton, who commanded 
the Fighting Fifth Division at AVaterloo. Queen Anne, who 
used to come to St. Paul's in great state and procession to 
thank God for the victories won for her by the Duke of Marl- 
borough, and whom she afterwards betrayed — has a bronze 
statue erected in the pediment of the Cathedral. 

Besides these M'orthies, the tombs of Collingwood, Nel- 
son's friend, AVren, Pennie, the builder of London Bridge, 
and Mylnc, of Waterloo Bridge, Dr. Samuel Johnson, who ex- 
pected to be buried in Westminster Abbey, and was disap- 
pointed, like many others. Sir William Jones, Sir Astley 
Cooper, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Turner, the greatest colorist 
England has ever produced, Fuseli, Barry, Sir Thomas Law- 
rence, Opie, West and other famous painters, John, of Gaunt, 
Vandyke, Dr. Donne, Sir C. Ilatton, Dean Colet, founder of 
St. Paul's School, and Sir Nicholas Bacon are buried in the 
crypt imder St. Faith's — the parish church of St. Paul's — 
which is quite contiguous to the latter. 

There are monuments to Bishop Heber, Loi-d Comwallis, 
Nelson, Peynolds, Johnson, Sir John Moore, Elliott, who de- 
fended Gibraltar, Lord Howe, Rodney, Ponsonby, Admiral 
Dundas, and a large number beside of their country's defend- 
ers in the Cathedral. 



,. I'KICES OF ADMISSION. 491 

To speak plainly the interior does not look like a eliurcli of 
God at all. It is simply a huge Pantheon, with monumental 
effigies, and slabs indicating the virtues, heroism, gallantry 
and acts in battle of innumerable soldiers and sailors who have 
fought for Britain in times gone by. The vast Rotunda and 
the gigantic Dome do not give the idea of a church, and the 
pillars and cornices have little in their aspect to make a spec- 
tator feel that he stands in tlic presence of the Almighty. 

Yet the monuments and the vastness of the Cathedral are 
worthy of inspection, though the exterior of the Catliedral is 
far more imposing than the interior, owing to the fact that the 
real height of the walls of the body of the editice is marked by 
a double row of jnllars, which are ranged on top of eacli other, 
giving to the spectator an impression that the Catliedral walls 
to the roof, exclusive of the dome and cupola, are twice as 
high as they are in reality. 

The following are the ciiargcs to see the different ])laces in 
the Cathedral: — to the body of the church, 2d.; to the Whis- 
pering Gallery and the outside galleries around the dome, Gd. ; 
to the Library, the Model Hoom, the Geometrical Staircase in 
the south turret, and the Great Jiell, which weighs 12,000 
pounds. Is. ; to the Ball at the toj). Is. Od. ; to the dock, 2d., 
and to the vaults Is., in all 4s. 4d. from each visitor; which is 
nothing less than a downright robbery. This is })laying Bar- 
num with a vengeance. 

It was the great l^ell of St. Paul's which a soldier on the ram- 
parts at AVindsor, twenty miles away, heard striking thirteen 
strokes one night, instead of twelve, lie was tried for sleeping 
on his post, found guilty, and sentenced to death, and would have 
suffered had it not lx;eii for his stout heart, and his ])ersistent 
assertion that he heard the bell strike thirteen instead of 
twelve strokes. It was ])roved that the bell did strike thir- 
teen on the night in question, l>y the mistake of the ringer, 
and thus the soldier was exonerated. 

It was for this sjime bell that Henry YIII. and a dissolute no- 
bleman named Partridge, rattled the dice one night; and finally 
Ilenry lost the stake. Partridge having won, died in the same 



492 ST, Paul's cathedral. 

year in an unfortunate manner, just before he had made up his' 
impious mind to have the bell melted down. This was 
looked upon as a judgment of God, for in those days judg- 
ments of God were of common occurrence. 

The grandest sight ever seen under the dome of St. Paul's 
was the funeral of Kelson, which took place January 0, 1806. 
The body was brought through the streets from AVhitehall 
Stairs, with the King, Lord Mayor, the Lords of the Admi- 
ralty, the Princes of the Blood, the nobles, prelates and civic 
companies following, through densely packed streets, which were 
almost impassable, for all England was there in heart, if not in 
body. The bands played the " Dead March in Saul" during 
the afternoon, and minute guns were fired from the Tower 
and along the wharves as the body passed. Hardy, Kelson's 
post-captain, and forty-eight sailors, who had seen the hero die, 
surrounded the corpse, and when the body was taken from the 
hearse into the vast Cathedral, a clear space was formed amid 
all that great sea of faces by the Highland soldiers of Aber- 
eromby, who had been with Kelson in Egypt and at Aboukir. 
Above was the immense dome, and from its dark and impene- 
trable depths depended a huge octagonal lantern, encircled by 
innumerable lamps. 

Then came the words from the lips of the prelate who 
ofliciated : 

" I am the Pesurrection and the Life, and he M'ho believeth 
in me though he were dead, yet shall he rise again," the 
mighty organ bursting forth — and out of all that vast multitude 
went forth a great, tremendous sob as the body was lowered 
into the grave enshrouded by the oak which came from the 
enemies ship, and Kelson's flag, which he had borne at his 
masthead in victory so often was also about to be lowered, 
when suddenly the forty-eight sailors of his vessel, some of 
whom had carried his lifeless body from the deck to the cock- 
piit — as if moved by one impulse, closed around the grave, rent 
the flag in pieces, each man securing a piece of the sacred em- 
blem upon his person, as a testament of the greatest hero Eng- 
land ever saw, or ever will see again. 



CHAPTER XXXIY. 



GOING TO THE PLAY. 




HERE can be no doubt but that London 
is a QJty much given to amusement, and 
I question if there can be found another 
city which spends more money and with 
a better grace, to support music and the 
drama. 

It is very true that in a great degree 
~ the cheap amusement halls of London 

are of the very lowest kind to be found anywhere, but then the 
reader must understand that the greater number of theatre going 
and music-loving people never enter these haunts, which have 
won so much infamy among strangers. I refer, of course, to 
such places as the Argyle, the Alhambra, Cremorne, the Ca- 
sino, and other resorts of the kind. 

I think that the Londoners as compared with the Parisians, 
give a great deal more money for the amusements which they 
attend than the Parisians do for theirs. 

Lately the French government has been compelled to build for 
the delectation of the Parisians, a splendid opera house, and be- 
sides the cost of this structure, M-hich was two million of dollars, 
the government of France pays the following annual subventions 
or donations for opera alone: to the Italian Opera 120,000 
francs, French Opera 900,000, francs and 250,000 francs to the 
Opera Comicpie, beside 200,000 francs annually to the Conser- 
vatoire, where music is taught. 
, In London, however, the support of such places is volun- 



494 



GOING TO THE PLAY. 



tary, and jig state interference is dreamed of, save that of the 
Lord Clianibcrlaiu wlio is a sort of censor, and whose duty is 
chiefly to see that the ballet-girls do not abbreviate their skirts 
too much. 

The most popular and ladylike actress in London is Miss 
Keilson, who performs at the Lyceum, the Princess's and 
Queen's Theatres. This young and charming actress is a 

favorite with all 
classes, owing to 
her perfect skill as 
an artiste, and her 
reputation is with- 
out reproach. She 
is known as "Beau- 
tiful Miss Xeilson," 
and is of medium 
height, with dark, 
languishing eyes, in 
wliich the fire of 
genius burns, with 
a steady flame. Miss 
Kate Batcman, now 
Mrs. Dr. Crowe, is 
also a great favorite 
with the London- 
ers, and most de- 
servedly so, for she 
has not her equal on the English stage in her distinctive line 
of characters. AVho that ever saw the last act of " Leah," or 
the " Prison Scene " in "Mary Warner," -will deny her terrible 
power as an actress. The English capital is divided into two 
camps as to the merits of the rival comedians — Lawrence, 
Toole and John Baldwin Buckstone. Alfred "SVigan, and our 
own " Dundreary Sothern," stand high in the ranks of their pro- 
fession, and no English comedian ever met with a more success- 
ful triumpli in his OAvn land than that earned by John S. Clarke 
at the Strand Theatre in 18G9-70. French plays are very well 




■ BEAUTIFUL MISS NEILSON. 



FULL DRESS KEQUIRKD. 495 

received at the St. James Theatre — and I liad the pleasure of 
listening to Schneider, in "Barbe Bleue" and " Oiiihee aux 
Enter," who was supported by Dupuis, the celebrated tenor. 
Having visited many theatres in England, I can safely avow 
'that I never saw an English comedy, or a jjlay dealing with 
English characters and English homes, performed in better 
taste, or with more fidelity, than I have seen like plays pro- 
duced at Wallack's Theatre, in Xew York City. 

Nearly all London theatres except the Queen's, in Long 
Acre, are dark and gloomy, and in the opera liouses, the old 
style of erecting the private boxes or logos tier over tier 
and then hanging them with red velvet, gives a peculiarly 
heavy look to the interiors. Besides, prices for reserved seats 
are a\\'fully high, and unless a man is the possessor of a pretty 
large private fortune, he cannot think of indulging in opera at 
alh^ As a proof of this I will here subjoin the prices at the 
ILaymarket Opera House or " Her Majesty's," as it is called. 
The performances were Italian, German, and French, Grand 
Opera, and ballet : 

Tariff of prices for private boxes: Pit boxes, 150 guineas for 
the season; grand tier, 200 guineas; one pair, 150 guineas; two 
pair, 100 guineas; orchestra stalls, 25 guineas; pit tickets, 10s. 
6d.; amphitheatre stalls, 5s.; gallery, 2s. Gd. Opera on Tues- 
days, Thursdays, and Saturdays, and special extra nights. No 
extra charge for booking places. Evening dress to boxes, stalls 
and pit. Gratuities to boxkeepers optional. Doors open at 
eight ; j)erformance commences at half-past eight. 

These prices, it will be seen, are simply frightful. Then, 
unless you go in the gallery, you must be in full dress swallow- 
tail and white choker, which is not relished by Americans, and 
particularly by those from the back-woods, who are not very 
familiar with evening dress coats. Of course the large sums 
are the subscriptions for a season of perhaps thirty nights. 

At the Covent Garden Opera House, the tariff of prices is as 
follows : 

Private boxes: Second tier, 2^ guineas; first tier, near the 
stage, 3 guineas ; ditto, at the side, 4 guineas ; ditto, in the 



496 GOING TO THE PLAY. 

centre, 5 guineas ; grand tier, 6 guineas ; pit tier, 5 guineas ; 
Pit stalls, 21s.; pit, Ts.; amphitheatre, 2s. 6d.; amphitheatre stalls, 
front row, 10s. Gd.; second row Ts.; all other rows, 5s. No 
extra charge for booking places. Evening dress to all parts 
except the amphitheatre and amphitheatre stalls. Xo gratuities 
allowed to boxkeepers. Doors open at eight; performance 
commences at half-past eight. 

In most of the theatres in London hideous old women or 
shabby looking men attend in the lobbies, and wait upon the 
people who have need for their services during the night, de- 
manding a fee for every trifling errand, and in a first-class 
place of amusement, a boxkeeijer would be insulted if offered 
less than a shilling for turning a key. 

And then there are terrible young blackguards who insist 
upon the stranger's buying oranges, walnuts or apples from 
them, or else he must take their chaif as it is given. 

But the biggest swindle of all is, that a man nmst jxay two 
pence for the programme of the play, or three pence or four 
pence, as the case may be, and yet I have heard Englishmen 
tell me with audacity that they lived in a free country. 

And now before I proceed to tell anything of the London 
theatres, I will give a table of the prices and the time of oi^en- 
ing doors, with the location of each place of amusement for the 
benefit of those who may visit London : 

The Adelphi, 411 Strand; admission, seven o'clock — 6s., 
5s., 3s., 2s., Is. 6d., Is., and 6d. ; Astley's, Westminster 
Road, Lambeth; seven o'clock — 5s., 3s., 2s., Is, Cd., Is., and 
6d. ; BuriANNiA, Iloxton Old Town, will hold 3,400 persons ; 
half-past six o'clock — 2s., Is., 6d., and 3d. ; City of London, 
36 Norton Folgate ; seven o'clock — 2 s.. Is., and 6d. ; Covent 
Gakden, Bow street ; eight o'clock — Ts., 5s., 3s., 2s. 6d., 2s., 
and Is. It was built in 1S49, with Floral ILill adjoining. Its 
size, 240 feet by 123 feet, and 100 feet high, equals that of La 
Scala, the largest in Europe. Dkuky Lane, seven o'clock — 
Ts., 5s., 2s., Is., and 6d. ; Grecian, City Koad, seven o'clock 
— Is., 6d., and 3d.; IIaymarket, seven o'clock — Ys. 5s., 3s., 
2s., and Is.; IIer Majesty's, corner of IIaymarket, eight 



ASTLEY S A^IPIIITHEATKE. 497 

o'clock — Vs., 5s., 3s., 2s. 6cl., 2s., and Is.; IIoT.noR^r, High 
Ilolborn, nearly opposite Chancery Lane, seven o'clock — Gs., 
4s., 2s., Is. Gd., Is., and Gd.; Lyceum, Strand, seven o'clock — 
6s., 5s., 3s., 2s., and Is. ; Olymi'ic, AVych street, Drnry Lane, 
half-past seven o'clock — Gs., 4s., 2s., Is.; Maeylebone, Port- 
man Market, seven o'clock — 3s., 2s., Is., and Gd. ; Pavilion, 
Whitechapel, half-past six o'clock — 2s,, Is., and Gd. ; Prince 
OF "Wales, Tottenham Court Poad, seven o'clock — Gs., 3s., Is. 
Gd., Is., and Gd. ; Princess's, Oxford street, seven o'clock — 
Gs., 5s., 4s., 2s., and Is. ; Queen's, Long Acre, formerly St. 
Martin's Hall, seven o'clock — Gs., 5s., 4s., 2s. Gd., 2s., and Is.; 
KoYALTY or Sono, Dean street, Oxford street, half-past seven 
o'clock — 5s., 3s., Is., and Gd. ; Poyal AMPiirrnEATRE, High 
Holborn, ^vest of Ped Lion street, seven o'clock — is., 2s,, Is. 
Gd., and Is, ; Sadler's Wells, Clerkenwell, seven o'clock — 
3s., 2s., Is., and Gd,; Standard, Shoreclitch, half-past six 
o'clock — 3s,, Is, Gd,, Is,, Gd., and 3d., burnt down in ISGG, is 
rebuilding; St. James's, King street, St. James's Square, half- 
past seven o'clock — is., 3s., 2s., and Gd. ; Strand, Strand, 
seven o'clock — 5s., 3s., Is. Gd., andG. ; Surrey, Blackfriar's 
Poad, seven o'clock — 3s., 2s,, Is. Gd., Is., and Gd. ; Victoria, 
Kew Cut, Lambeth, half-past six o'clock — Is. Gd., Is., Gd., 
and 3d. 

Druiy Lane, which was built in 1812, will seat 1,700 per- 
sons, and its vestibule and saloons are as fine as any in Europe. 
Pi'ivate boxes in the J^ondon theatres range in price for a sin- 
gle seat at from one guinea to four j^ounds, or from $5 to 
$20 a night. The Olympic seats 2,000 ; the Adelphi 1,500 ; 
Astley's Circus 4,000, and the gallery of the Yictoria will seat 
2,000, while the Pit of the Pavilion, a murderous hole in 
Whitechapel, seats 1,500 roughs. 

Astley's is a sort of Hippodrome for spectacles, and is mudi 
loved by young London for the prancing of its horses and its 
grand shows. Astley's is at Lambeth, on the Surrey side of 
the Thames, and is in the heart of the democratic quarter of 
London. The present building is the fourth erected upon this 
site. The first was one of the nineteen theatres built by 



498 GOING TO THE PLAY. 

Philip Astlcy, and was opened in 1773, bnrnt in 1794; re- 
built 1795, burnt 1803; rebuilt 1804, burnt June 8, 1841, 
within two hours, the house being principally constructed from 
old ship-timber. It was rebuilt, and opened April 17, 1843, 
and has since been enlarged. There is only one other theatre 
in London for equestrianism ; and the stud of trained horses 
numbers from fifty to sixty. 

Philip Astley, originally a cavalry soldier, commenced 
horsemanship in 1763, in an open field at Lambeth. lie built 
his first theatre partly with £00, the produce of an unowned 
diamond ring which he found on Westminster Bridge. An- 
drew Ducrow, subsecpiently proprietor of the Amphitheatre, 
was born at the Xag's Head, Borough, in 1793, M'lien his 
father, Peter Ducrow, a native of Bruges, was " the Flemish 
Hercules" at Astley' s. The fire in 1841 arose from ignited 
wadding, such as caused the destruction of the old Globe The- 
atre in 1613, and Covent Garden Theatre in 1808. Andrew 
Ducrow died January 26, 1842, of mental derangement and 
paralysis, produced by the above catastrophe. 

Covent Garden theatre is the second one built on its site, 
— it being a strange fact that nearly all the theatres in Lon- 
don have been burnt down from time to time. It was here 
that the "O. P.," or "Old Prices," riots took place in 1804, and 
continued for seventj^-seven nights, the management having 
made an attempt to raise the prices, but at last they had to back 
down before the popular storm. Incledon, Charles Kemble, 
Mrs. Glover, George Frederick Cooke, Miss O'Neill, Macready, 
FaiTcn, Fanny Kemble, Adelaide Kemble and Edmund Kean 
have strutted their brief hours on its stage, but now the house 
is entirely devoted to opera. 

Drury Lane Theatre, or " Old Druiy," as it is sometimes 
known, and was at one time called the " Wilderness " by Mrs. 
Siddons, is situated in one of the loAvcst quarters of London, 
where vice, crime, poverty and drunkenness abound, but still it 
is frequented by the best classes of the play-going public. Here, 
one night in August, 1869, I saw "Formosii" played to a very 
full liouse, the excitement about the Ilan'ard and Oxford race 



A GIN PUBLIC IN THE NEW CUT. 499 

having culminated about this time. It was then under the 
direction of Mr. Dion Boucicault, who lias made and lost 
two or three fortunes in the management of theatres. All 
the famous disciples of the histrionic art who live in English 
dramatic history, have appeared during the last tAvo Inmdred 
years on the boards of Old Drury. 

In 1799 sixteen persons were trodden to death in an alarm 
which took place at the Ilaymarket theatre. 
^ There is a little theatre called the Adelphi, in the Strand, 
near Cecil street where I had rooms for some time, and this 
little dirty theatre, which has a vestibule like the entrance to a 
New York lager bier saloon, has been very much frequented 
by Her Majesty, Queen Victoria. This royal lady has some 
queer tastes, and among them is a fondness for broad tarce or 
low comedy. She is also fond of the piano, which she learned 
from a Mrs. Anderson, and sometimes when she inlays she 
likes to be accompanied by two or three of the most distin- 
guished violinists that can be procured. The Queen used to 
sing, and in the old days, when the world was new to her and 
before she had been MddoAved, it was the custom at the nice little 
private parties which she gave, to have Prince Albert sing with 
her, while the Hon, Mrs. Grey, wife of her Secretary (and a 
lady who had a good deal of work in helping to compose the 
Queen's memoirs), performed on the piano. 

In every place of amusement in London, be it high or low, 
there is a place set apart for the Queen's family, so that should 
she take a notion to visit the most out of the way place, she 
may be certain of being able to secure a secluded nook or loge 
where she will not be intruded upon. 

In the vicinity of all the theatres of the lower grade in and 
about London, I found nests of cheap public houses or drink- 
ing bars, and toward nine or ten o'clock, while the perfor- 
mances are at the height of dramatic agony, these resorts are 
crowded, with persons of both sexes, who have slipped out of 
the amusement halls to get a pint of beer or "tuppence" 
worth of " jjin neat." Gin " neat " is gin without water or 
sugjir, and this drink is very popular among women of the 

lowest class in London. 
31 



500 



GOING TO THE PLAY. 



In "Waterloo Hoad, close upon the Yictoria theatre, I saw 
one of these " gin ])ublifs," the doore of whieh were choked 
with customers passing in and out from the adjoining tlieatre. 
Tliere were negroes, Malays and Chinamen, with an ovei'flow- 
ing majority of Cockneys, in the " public," all of whom were 




A GIN FCEUO IN TUE NEW CUT. 



busily engaged in assuaging their thirst, or firing np their 
stomach furnaces. Not a little puzzled was I, to see women 
with small children in their arms, drinking alongside of sooty 
coal-bargemen — negroes, and young children, who had been 
driven by their miserable parents to beg coppers wherewith to 



IN THE GALLEKT OF THE "viC." 501 

procure them gin. It was a dreadful scene to witness, and tlie 
smiling fiend behind the bar was ])ositively fat and enjt»ying 
the liaggardness in some of his customers' laces. 

I had been t()ld that there was a theatre on the Surrey side 
of the river, in which, if I visited it, 1 might find all the nn- 
waslied elements of the London democracy at lionie, and one 
evening I found myself before its door, after a long journey. 

This was the " Iloyal Victoria Theatre," New Cut, Lam- 
beth. The Bowery, in its palmiest and most glorious days, 
could not hold a candle to this histrionic temple. Its trage- 
dies and dramas of the highway robber and George I>arnewell 
apprentice school are not, perhaps, to be e(pialed in any thea- 
tre in the world. The Porte St. Martin, in Paris, is a mere 
training-school of horror compared Avith this, the most blood- 
thirsty of places of amusement. There were two entrances — 
one for the aristocracy of Lambetli, the other for the underfed 
plough-holders, or, rather, for the Costermongers. The aristo- 
cratic entrance had a dai-k, dirty box-office, illumined by a pair 
of gas-jets that could hardly find air to flutter in, so strong 
Avas the stench of men and filthy materialism. 

Over the door of the box-office was a sign, " Pit, Od.; gal- 
lery, 3d.; private stage boxes, 2s." The crowds pushed hard 
and fast to ffet an entrance. Thev came in swarms of fustian 
and corduroys, with unkemi)t hair, the bosoms of some of the 
costerwomen almost laid bare M'ith thot-shoA-ing and crushing ; 
the lads and men wearing heavy hob-nailed shoes, such shoes as 
are never seen in America excepting on the feet of emigrants, 
M'ho stream through the gates of Castle Garden from the waste 
of Atlantic waters — and these heavy hobnailed shoes did won- 
ders in hurrying the progress of the front ranks, by repeated 
applications to the calves and ankles of those who had the good 
or bad luck to stand nearest the door of the theatre. 

After a severe struggle, in which some greasy corduroys are 
ri})j)ed and several ca]>s lost, and a munber of babies squeezed — 
who are in the arms of girls hardly old enough, one would think, 
to be their lawful mothers — vre get clear of the mob, shouting, 
screaming, and whistling, and pass up the dirty, rickety 



502 



GOING TO THE PLAY. 



stairs to the three-penny Gallery of the " Vic," as the theatre 
is called by the class who frequent it ; and now a sight presents 
itself to the writer such as is seldom seen, and never in any 
city but London. 

I lost my hat on the stairs, and in the crush I discovered it in 
the hands of a mutinous boy, about a dozen steps below me, 
who threatened if I did not give him a sixpence "to kick tHe 




TUE GALLERY OP THE " VIC. 



brains hout liof hit." I give the truly amusing boy six- 
pence and the hat is flung up to mc much the worse for wear, 
while a young girl with a dowdy bonnet and a face sAvelled 
with gin asks nie in chafi'if I am fond of "periwinkles." 

The gallery of the Yictoria is one of the largest in the world, 
and will hold, on a modest computation, 2,200 people. 



THE CIIOEUS OF " IMMENSEKOFF." 503 

Five minutes after I found myself in the gallery ; it "was 
crowded and not a seat could be had, for these people gather 
at the theatre doors, and fill the surrounding streets and lanes 
for an hour before the place is advertised to be open. 

As I have no seat and look rather out of jjlace, several cheer- 
ful young ladies ofier to let me sit in their laps, and facetious 
remarks are made on the different articles of apparel which I 
have on me. Being a very warm evening, nearly all of tlie 
males, men and boys, arc in their shirt-sleeves, and it grieves 
one to think that many of these shirts are sadly in need of 
washing, and not a few want repairing. The boys and men 
are liardly seated when they fall into something like tlie Old 
Bowery tramp — only that here they all seem to be acquainted 
with the same slang song, and it is sung by them in a loud, 
full, and not unmelodious chorus, with a vehemence that 
shakes the old timbers of the house. 

In the well-ordered pit of the Bowery theatre in other days, 
if I remember right, such truly scandalous conduct would have 
instantly been suppressed by the strong arm and heavy stinging 
cane of the brawny fellow who stood with his back to the stage, 
immediately behind the orchestra ; his watchful eyes suiweying 
every nigged face in the pit, and ready with his powerful arm 
to rain blows like a storm on the shoulders of the brawler. 

I should like to see a man with a brawny ann and cane try 
the same thing on the audience in the gjillery of the " Yic." I 
am sure he would be thrown over the rail into the lower part 
of the theatre, particularly if he were to interrupt a chorus. 
Many of the men and lads, who have their entire week's earn- 
ings in their pockets, are very drunk ali*eady, though it is only 
half-past seven o'clock of the Satiu'day night. The chorus 
which they are singing is that of a popular street and mu- 
sic-hall song, which every one is now humming in London. 
They sung it as follows : 

" Ha 1 my dear frens, pray 'ow de doo, 
Hi 'opes I sees yer well, 
Peer'aps yer don't know 'oo I is ; 
Well, tlien, I'm the Heastern swell. 



50-1: GOING TO THE PLAY. 

My cliambers is in Sboreditcli, 
And I fancy I'm a TofF; 
From top to toe I really think 
I looks — Immensekoff. 

ImmensekoflF — Immeneekoff, 

Behold me a Shoreditch Toff — 

A toff, a toff, a Shoreditch Toff, 

Hand I thinks myself — Immensekoff." 

" Come Imp tlicre, ye lazy fiddlers, and give us our tlirip- 
pence worth," shouts an irate lad to the orchestra, who are 
scraping and rosining their instruments. 

" Yes, give us moosic for our money, old bald head," shouts 
another young ruffian to the despised leader of the orchestra, 
who responds with a wave, and then we have "God Save the 
Queen," done after the style popular in the Xew Cut. 

When this is over a red-headed fellow, with his arms bare 
and perspiring like the lower animal that he is, cries out loud- 
ly, " Kow for the next varse, and give us a good chorious," 
and then they all commence again : 

" Vith the fair sec', bless 'em, need I say — 
That hi am ' number Von ;' 
Hits really quite a bore to me 
The way the gals do run — 
Not away from me — but hafter me. 
Hah — you may laugh and scoff, 
But I can tell yer — that the gala 
Think me — Immensekoff. 

Immensekoff— Immensekoff." 

And so on for five mortal verses the Avhole mad swarm of 
dirty, ignorant wretches, keeping time with liands and feet 
until my head ached, and I went down the narrow stairs, while 
a number of polite young ladies inquired as I passed, "if I had 
been sea-sick." The descent to the lower part of the theatre 
was about forty-feet, down a dimly lighted stairs, and I 
found myself in the family circle, as it M'ould be called in 
America, the seats being of planed planks without cushions, 
while the aisles were crowded with people, as above in the 
three-penny gallery. 



I 



THE "terror of LONDON." 505 

Here tlic admission was, I think, a shilling, and the a^^di- 
ence M'as a little more select, yet not enough to cause re- 
mark from a stranger. The door-keeper told me he could get 
me a seat in a private box on the stage for two shillings, and I 
followed him through another dirty, dark passage, my feet 
crushing tlie shells of walnuts and filberts, which here take 
the place of the old time peanuts. 

I was solicited to buy sandwiches of a very ancient aspect by 
several men, and pigs' feet and sheep's trotters by a number 
of women, at a penny and "tuppence" apiece; and a boy 
with a large flat basket offered me a pint of periwankles for 
" three ha'pence," " all fresh, sir ;" and finally I got into the 
box on the stage, which gave me a very good view of the en- 
tire theatre and its sweltering audience. Pit, circle, and 
" three-penny " gallery were packed with human heads, tier 
upon tier, in a manner that seemed to defy description. 

The walls ■were rough, and in some places but poorly pa- 
pered, and in the cornel's of the upper gallery, flirtation, small- 
talk, and chaff m- ent on so audibly that I could hear almost 
what was sjjoken, or rather cried out from the gallery, although I 
was at the other extremity of the building. Great anxiety was 
manifested to have the curtain hoisted by the unruly audience, 
and not a little shouting was done to make the fiddlers hurry 
up their overture. 

The piece was called the " Terror of London," and it de- 
picted the life of an apprentice who had departed from the 
ways of honesty to take up with bad companions in pot-houses, 
and was in four acts. The apprentice was of course the hero of 
the drama, and the author of the piece played the character of 
the abused apprentice. Whenever the apprentice kicked a police- 
man or threw one of his pursuers down a dark trap-door, there 
was great applause of his dexterity ; but when the villain of 
the piece, a snaky-looking wretch, imworthy to breathe the 
"a-i-r-r-r of heving," slapped his hands after the commission of 
a fresh crime, he was received with derisive shouts and yells, 
which he, however, took as compliments to his histrionic 
skill. 



506 Goma to the play. 

The licroine of the piece was in love with the unfortunate 
and dissipated apprentice, and did notliing but clasp lier liands 
and tear lier hair at his "goings on." But at last she was 
roused to furj when the villain of the play followed the dis- 
honest apprentice to his mother's grave to give liim up to the 
police. The apprentice was discovered lying across a painted 
marble tombstone, and wlien the police entered, led on by the 
lieavy villain, the heroine threw her body between him and 
his enemies, and drawing her form to its full height, she de- 
claimed thus: 

" The fust m-a-n who places his polyuted touch on the form 
of my nobil up-e-r-en-tis, though he were doubly armed with 
the king's authority, shall find his fate on the point of tliis 
pon-yard." 

After this necessary outburst several more people were 
killed, and the whole concluded with the dying scene at Ty- 
burn, the gallows, and the culprit, the bowl of ale, and the ap- 
prentice asking his friends if they would not prevent him from 
dying a disgraceful death. Here he makes an attempt to escape, 
and is pistoled admirably by the villain, who is convenient, 
and who is in turn pistoled by the apprentice's sweetheart, 
she being also ready at the proper moment for action. Then the 
curtain went down, and a stout girl, with fat leg's and a green 
pair of tights, danced a hornpipe, which was loudly encored, 
the young lady being encouraged by such remarks as : 

" Do you want some kidney pies ? " 

" Kick up, Miss Jenny." 

" Don't mind the shoes ; we pays for that." 

" Tell the fiddlers to give it to yer 'otter — vy, yer not danc- 
ing at all !" 

Eveiy one in the theatre seemed to be on speaking terms 
with each and all of the performers, and, m some instances, 
the latter would answer the chaft' back merrily, an inces- 
sant fire of replies and counter-replies being kept up that 
was amusing, if not edifying. While the dancing was going 
on an old woman made her entrance into the box where 1 
was sitting, and asked if "I didn't want some porter or 



"do you wajtt some kidnp:y pies?" 



507 



kidney pics." At the "Vic" it is the custom to eat during the 
performance, and drink porter or beer, which is bronglit by 
old women and boys between the acts, and sold at fouqicnee 
a bottle. Then the dancing girl retired gracefully amid great 
applause. She was succeeded by a comic singer, who sang, in 
a green coat and kerseys, a song, the burden of which was : 

'• Wait for the turn of the tide, boys. 
For Rome wasn't built in a day : 
Whatever through life may betide, boys. 
Why, wait for the turn of the tide." 

This concluded the performance, and the curtain went down, 
and the lights in the dirty lamps being extinguished, the 
roughest audience of the roughest playhouse in London wan- 
dered right and left, up and down the Xew Cut to their homes, 
or else they stopped to drink and drain in the pot-houses, or 
choke the thoroughfare to buy in the street market, which was 
now — eleven o'clock — at the height of commercial prosperity. 
Eleven o'clock tolled from St. Paul's as I repassed Waterloo 
Bridge back to the city, and the Thames swam and bubbled 
calmly against the stone piers of the massive bridge. 




CHAPTER XXXV. 



BILLINGSGATE FISH MARKET. 




/HEN a foot passenger crossing London Bridge 
looks down tlie river to the left, he cannot help 
noticing a little cluster of masts tapering up- 
ward from a series of small hulks and craft 
wliich lie quite near to each other, in the 
shadow of a long building of part brick and 
stone, the river side of which is open and 
crowded with people of both sexes from an 
early hour of the morning. 
This is the famous Billingsgate Fish Market, which has given 
or originated a synonym for blackguardism and low abuse all 
the world over. 

The market for many years consisted of a collection of 
wooden pent houses, rude sheds, and benches, and the business 
fonnerly commenced at three o'clock in the summer and at 
five in winter. In the latter season it was a strange scene, 
its large, flaming lamps of oil, showing a crowd of fish ven- 
ders and fish buyers struggling amid a Babel din of vulgar 
tongues, which has rendered Billingsgate a b}i\'ord for abuse 
and foul-mouthed language. Addison has referred to the 
Billingsgate fish- wives and to their quarrels as "the debates 
which frequently arise among ladies of the British fishery." 

The old style Billingsgate fish-woman wore a strong, stiff 
gown tucked up, with a large quilted petticoat ; her liair, cap 
and bonnet flattened into a mass from carrying fish baskets 
upon her head ; her coai*se cracked voice, her bloated face and 



PROFIT ON FISH. 509 

her large brawny limbs eomp.eting the picture of the old Bil- 
linjjsffate " fish facj." 

This vii'ago lias disappeared and a new market building was 
erected in 1849. A stone river-wall was constructed where an 
old mud bank formerly existed and the surface was filled in 
and levelled to equalize the grade in Thames street on which 
the market has its frontage. Within, the ground was excavated 
and formed into a lower market, which has two subterranean 
openings on the river, for the sale of shellfish, oysters, muscles, 
prawns, penwinkles, and whelks. These shellfish are kept in 
large half puncheons liound with iron hoops. The market has 
a supei-ficial area of 2,700 feet, but the drainage in the lower 
market is very bad as it is below the level of the river. The 
upper market is open to the public through two large arched 
apertures, 400 feet wide, and below it is bounded by eigh- 
teen dark arches which are used by the salesmen as depositories 
for their goods. These arches are entirely without ventilation 
and even the market itself, thronged as it is for twelve hours 
of the day, receives no air but that which comes in a chance 
way from the already vitiated atmosphere of the neighbor- 
hood. The market is covered on the side next to London 
Bridge by a roof of rough glass. The light iron c<)lumns 
which serve to support the roof, also serve to divide the mar- 
ket into a series of narrow gang^vay8, and within these gang- 
ways the dealers take their stand to vend and auction 
the fish every morning, book and pencil in hand, and their 
aprons hanging from their chests to their knees. There is a 
clock tower on the building and a bell which is rung at five 
o'clock every morning to announce the opening of the market, 
and then is M'itnessed a general rush like the retreat of an army. 
The railways alone carry to this market annually, 15,000 
tons of fish, besides the amount which is brought' by water. 

Five hundred years ago this market produced a rental of 
forty-six ix)unds per annum ; to-day there is a firm which has 
a small stall whose profits on fish amount to £10,000 a year, 
and the good-will of one fish merchant in the market, I believe, 
was purchased last year for tlie large sum of £30,000. About 



510 BILLINGSGATE FISH MAKKLT. 

tlic same time that the market rental ^^'as forty-six poimcls a 
year, the hest soles sold for tlirce pence per dozen, the best 
turlxtt for six pence each, the best mackerel one penny cacli, the 
best 2)ickled lierrings one penny the score ; fresh oysters two 
pennies a gallon, and the best eels two pennies per qnarter of 
a himdred. AVilliam AVallace, the Scottish hero, was then a 
prisoner in the Tower, and Bannockburn had not been won by 
I>rnce, and the ink on the Magna Charta was hardly dry. 

In 1548, although tlie king of England was a Protestant, 
and the government a Protestant one, yet an act was passed 
which imposed a penalty on those who ate flesh on lish days. 
This was to protect the trade in the fisheries, however, and not 
to interfere with the private religions opinions of the people. 
The consumption of fish in the household of Thomas, Earl ot 
Lancaster, in the year 1314, was 6,800 stock fish, consisting of 
ling, haberdine, etc., besides six barrels of sturgeon, the vrhole 
valued at £00 of the money of that period 
I It is four o'clock of a summer morning at Billingsgate mar- 
ket and all London is as yet solitary, and the streets are un- 
peopled by traffic or pedestrians. The sight from London 
Bridge is magnificent on such a moniing. In the words of the 
poet who looked upon this same scene: 

" This city now dotli like a garment wear 
The beauty of the morning ; silent, bare. 
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie. 
Open unto the fields and to the sky 
All bright and glittering in the smokelees air. 
Never did sun more beautifully steep 
In his first splendor valley, rock, or hill ; 
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep! 
The river glideth at its own sweet will ; 
Dear God ! The very houses seem asleep. 
And all that mighty heart is still." 

Biot, profligacy, want and misery have retired, and labor 
has scarcely risen. As we approach Billingsgate, the profound 
silence of the dawn is now and then broken by the wheels of 
the fishmonger's light cart, which is proceeding to the market. 

The whole area of the market, brilliantly lighted with stream- 



THE OYSTER BOATS. 613 

ing flames of gas, comes into xievr. One miglit fancy tliat the 
stalls were dressed for a feast. The tables of the Siilesmen, 
which are arranged from one side of the covered area to the 
other, afford ample space for clustering throngs of buyers 
aroimd each. The stalls appear to form one table, but the 
portion assigned to each is nine feet by six. Each salesman 
sits -with his back to another, and between them is a wooden 
shelf, so that they are apparently enclosed in a recess, but by 
this arrangement they escape having their pockets picked, a 
coimuon occurrence where there is a large crowd. There are 
about 200 fish salesmen in London and half of tliat nimiber 
have stalls in this market for which a pretty good rent is paid. 

Proceechng to the bottom of the market, we perceive the 
masts of the fishing boats rising out of the fog which envel- 
opes the river. The boats lie considerably below the level of 
the market, and the descent is by several laddei*s to a floating 
wharf, which rises and falls with the tide, and is there- 
fore always on the same le^■el with the boats. About fifty of 
these craft are moored alongside of each other. 

The oyster boats are crowded together by themselves. The 
buyer goes on board the oyster boat, as oysters are not sold in 
the oixlinary, morning market. The fishenueu and porters 
are busily engaged in armnging their cargoes for quick deliv- 
ers as soon as the market besrins. Two or three minutes be- 
fore five the salesmen take their seats in the enclosed recesses, 
watching each other eagerly. The ].>orters with their dirty can- 
vass aprous and their huge scooped hats stand ready with their 
baskets on their heads, but not one of them isallowed, however, 
to have the advantage of his fellows by an unfair start, or to 
overstep a Une marked out by the clerk of the market. 
The instant the clock strikes the melee commences and then 
woe to the bystander who blocks up the way — he is knoc-ked 
down and trampled on, and fish of all sizes are spilled over his 
prostrate body, while his eyes, hands, limbs and other mem- 
bers, are blessed with gre;it fervor by the porters. 

Each porter now nishes at his utmost speed to the respective 
salesman to whom his basket is consigned. The largest cod- 



514: BILLINGSGATE FISH MARKET. 

fish are brought in baskets ■vrhich contain four; tliose some- 
what smaller are brought in boxes ; and smaller sizes in doz- 
ens, and still larger numbers, but always in baskets. All fish 
are sold by the " tail," or by number excepting salmon, which 
are sold by weight, and oysters and shellfish by measure. The 
baskets are instantly emptied on the tables, and the porters 
hasten for a fresh supply. It is the fishennan's interest to bring 
his whole cargo into the market as soon as possible, for if the 
quantity brought to market be large, prices will fall the more 
quickly, and if they are high, buyers purchase less freely, and 
he may miss the sale. As, for example, a boat load of mack- 
erel from Brighton sold at Billingsgate for forty guineas per 
hundred, or seven shillings each, an extraordinary price — 
while the next boat load produced but thirteen guineas per 
hundred. 

The majority of the fishing vessels are sloops and schooners 
under fifty tons each, and of tliis number the greater part be- 
long to ports on the coast as follows : 

Yarmouth 630 

Faversham 416 

Brigliton 60 

Dartmouth 357 

Southampton 193 

Maldon 218 

Eochester 363 

Colchester 318 

Dover 180 

Rye 80 

Ramsgate 170 

balmon is conveyed by rail in large boxes, covered with 
pounded ice, which preserves them fresli for six days, and some- 
times in the summer months as many as 3,000 boxes of salmon 
are received at Billingsgate in a day. The salmon are sent to 
agents to be sold on commission at a profit of five to ten per 
cent., the agent taking the risk of bad debts, and the price va- 
ries from fivepence to a shilling a pound, according to the su]_>- 
ply in market. 

The best time to see Billingsgate is of a Friday morning be- 






BREAKFAST AT BILLINGSGATE. 515 

tween six and seven o'clock. The regular fish merchants 
come first and are served first, and tlien their places are taken 
bj the Costermongers, or street pedlars, who buy the refuse, 
or what is left. Lower Thames street, above and below Lon- 
don Bridge, is sure to be crammed full of fish carts and fish 
porters running hither and thither with baskets of fish upon 
their shoulders, and it is noticeable that the lower part of every 
building is open and the spaces filled with fish of all kinds, 
chiefly smoked and preserved fish, which are exposed in large 
baskets and boxes for sale. The proprietors of these i)laces, 
some of whom do business in salted and smoked fish with every 
part of the ciWlized globe, stand at the doors of their wholesale 
shops with large aprons upon them, although their bank ac- 
counts may amount to scores of thousands of pounds. 

Up Fish street as far as the monument are long lines of carts 
waiting for fish, drawn by asses and horses, and around the 
monument may be seen a jjcrfect circle of carts guarded by 
ragged boys, some of whom contract to take care of a dozen 
carts at a time for a penny a cart, while the Costers are pur- 
chasing the fish. 

Formerly the consumption of spirits here among the buyers 
of fiish was very great, but now at a very early hour in the 
morning a hot cup of cofiTee with a slice of bread and butter 
can be procured at any of the numerous cofiee stalls for two- 
pence-halfpenny. 

The men and women are shouting and hallooing at each 
other as if they were mad. Old gentlemen who have a good 
appetite and come here to make a market for their fami- 
lies, are very often seen to enter the tavern called the " Tln-ee 
Tuns," which is in the market enclosure, and at which a fish 
dinner or fish breakfast of three dishes can be procured for 
eighteen pence. It is very puzzling at first to understand the 
cries, which come hard and fast from the mouths of salesmen 
and hucksters, costers and pedlars of newspapers, frequenters 
of coffee stands, and other trades people. 

" Xow, you mussel buyers," shouts one, " come aloug — come 
along — now's your time for fine, fat, greasy, mussels." 



516 BILLINGSGATE FISH MARKET. 

" All alive ! al-ive oh — alive oli ! Ilan-soine cod ! best in 
the market. All alive oh ! " 

" Y-e-o — j-Q-o ! Y-e-o — here's your fine Yarmouth Bloaters ! 
Who's the buyer?" 

" Here you are, guv'-ner ; splendid whiting ! some of the 
right sort. 

"M-o-rning T-e-l-e-graph, one penny. Standard and 
Times. 

" Turbot ! all alive— turbot." 

" Glass o' nice peppermint ! this cold morning — ha'penny a 
glass ! " 

" Here you are at yer hown price ! Fine soles, Oh ! " 

" W-oy, w-o-y ! Now's your time — preguzzling sprouts — 
all large and no small 'uns." 

" II-u-1-l-o, li-u-1-l-o, here, I say — bewteeful lobsters — good 
and cheap — fine cock crabs, all alive, holi." 

" Xever mind 'im, guvner ; he'll cheat yer ; look at this 
'ere turbot — have that lot for a pound — come and see — now 
don't go away, guvner — the' re preshis cheap, and filling at the 
price." 

" Had-had-had-had-haddick — all fresh and good." 

"Here, this way — this way for splendid Skate — Skate O — 
Skate O." 

" Currant and meat puddin's, a penny each and werry 'ot." 
"Here's food for the belly and clothes for the back, but I 
sell food for the mind " (shouts the newspaper vender). 
"Here's smelt O!" "Here ye are, fine Finney haddick!" 
" Hot soup ! nice pea soup ! a-all hot ! hot ! Ahoy ! ahoy 
here ! live plaice ! all alive O ! Now or never ! whelk ! 
whelk! whelk! whelk! Who'll buy brill O! brill O! 
Capes ! wateq^roof capes ! sure to keep the wet out ! a shil- 
ling a piece ! Eels O ! eels O ! Alive ! alive O ! ' ' Fine 
flounders, a shilling a lot ! Who'll buy this prime lot of 
flounders? Shrimps! shrimps! fine shrimps! Wink! 
wink ! wink ! Hi ! hi-i ! here you are, just eight eels left, 
only eight ! O ho ! O ho ! this way — this way — this way ! 
Fish alive ! alive ! alive ! 



I 



THE CAPITAL INVESTED. 517 

" Fresh do you call these ? " says one who finds the price of 
a lot of sprats to high for him, "Look a-how they rolls Imp 
the vites of their heyes, as liif they ranted a little rain. I 
should say they hadn't a blessed smell of water for a week 
past." 

"Think I've been a robbin' of somebody?" says another. 
" Yy, bless you, all the whole bilin' of my customers hasn't 
got so much among 'em as would buy the lot — no, not if they 
sold their veskits." 

As many as two thousand persons breakfast at the coffee 
houses in the neighborhood of Billingsgate every morning, all 
of whom are engaged in the fish business. 

The folloAving estimate has been made of the gross amount 
of fish of difterent kinds, sold at Billingsgate market in the 
course of the year : 

Salmon, 750,000 

Live Codfisli 600,000 

Haddock 3,000,000 

Flounders 420,000 

Eels 12,000,000 

Yarmoulli Bloaters 200,000,000 

Red Herrings 75,000,000 

Sprats, 1.200,000,000 

Crabs 1,000,000 

Oysters 500,000,000 

Periwinkles 400,000,000 

Whiting 60,000,000 

Mackerel 30,000,000 

Sliriraps 600,000,000 

Soles 120,000,000 

Lobsters 2,500,000 

The capital embarked in this trade is something enormous 
to think of Salmon when scarce, have sold for tAventy 
shillings a pound. The market is the property of the Muni- 
cipality of London associated with the Company of Fishmong- 
ers, one of the most powerful and wealthy corporate societies 
in London. Fifty per cent of the gross amount of fish re- 
ceived at Billingsgate market is purchased by the Coster- 
mongers and sold from carts in the streets, at a small profit to 
the pedlars. 

32 




CHAPTEK XXXVL 

THE INNS OF COURT. 

HERE are four Inns of Conrt in London and 
thirteen Inns of Cliancery. Tlie Inns of 
Court are the Middle Temple, Inner Tem- 
ple, Lincoln's Inn, and Gray's Inn. The 
Inns of Chancery are Barnard's Inn, Hol- 
born; Clement's Inn, Strand; Cliiford's 
Inn, Fleet street ; Fnrnival's Inn, between 
Brook street and Leather lane ; Lyon's Inn, 
Strand; New Inn, Wyeh street; Sergeant's Inn, Chancery 
lane; Staple Inn, Ilolborn ; Sergeant's Inn, Fleet street; Sy- 
mond's Inn, Chancery Inn, and Thavie's Inn, 56 and 57 Hol- 

born Hill. 

These Inns of Conrt and Chancery are large boarding-honses 
or hotels ; and in the middle ages, they were called " inns" or 
"hostels," where students in law and Chancery were taught the 
legal science and ate their meals while living as students at a 
common table as in college. This is called " dining in hall,"^ and 
certain rules and regulations are prescribed so that the aspiring 
student may not expect to have the license of the American 
boarding-house, being in fact in a state of pupilage as was in- 
tended by the founders of the splendid (for I cannot use any 
other term) Inns of Court. 

In the old days of the York and Lancaster factions, the Ser- 
o-eants and " apprentices at law," as the students were called, 
each had their pillars in Old St. Paul's, and at the foot of the 
pillar the student, half kneeling, heard his client's case and 
jotted down the points on his tablet. 



GRAY S INN G.iKDENS. 519 

The four Inns of Court were frequented 1)y sons of wealthy 
commoners and the nobility, while the Inns of Chancery liad 
for pupils and boarders, the sons of merchants and tradesmen, 
who had not the means of paying the expenses of tlie Inns of 
Court which amounted to twenty marks, annually, a large sum 
in those days. 

About 8,000 students attend the Inns of Court and Chan- 
cery in London, and it is a very strange sight to see the dark 
chambers in some of these ancient Inns with their old fashioned, 
medigeval architecture, parapets, gate-ways, unillumined win- 
dows, courts, and passages, amidst one of the very busiest 
spots in London. 

Go inside of one of these courts and you shall no longer hear 
the sullen roar of the city, or the clatter of the omnibusses, nor 
the incessant and deafening din of hawkers and street pedlars. 
A monastic silence reigns, and in the grass-grown square of 
Lincoln's Inn, all is silent as the grave, and in the dim pas- 
sages of Clifford's and Clement's Inns, it is \'ery difficult to be- 
lieve that the densely -packed Strand and thronged Fleet street 
are so near. 

During Elizabeth's reign, alms were distributed twice a week 
at the gate of Gray's Inn, and James I. signified that none 
but gentlemen of descent and blood should be admitted to 
matriculate. The "Reader," a lazy official of Gray's had a lib- 
eral allowance of wine and venison for which sixpence and 
eightpence were paid per mess, and eggs and green sauce were 
breakfast dishes on Lenten day. Beer was then only six shil- 
lings a barrel. Caps were worn at supper by order, and hats 
and boots and spurs, and standing with the back to the fire in 
the hall were forbidden the students under penalty. Dice and 
cards were only allowed at Christmas. Two students slept in 
a bed and Coke and Littleton are said to have been at one 
time bed-fellows. 

Gray's Inn Gardens was one of the most pleasant places in 
London in the old days long agone, and during the reign of 
Charles I., it was frequented as a place of assignation. The 
principal entrance to Gray's Inn is from Ilolborn by a gate- 



620 



THE INXS OF COURT. 



way, a fine specimen of l)rick-work of 1542. The hall of Lin- 
coln's Inn lias an open oak roof, divided into seven bays by 
gothic arched ribs, the spandrils and pendants richly canned ; 
in the centre is an open louvre, which is pinnacled externally. 
The interior is nchly wainscoted, decorated with Tuscan col- 
umns, and the windows are of stained glass, gorgeously 
emblazoned. TJie library' 80 feet long, 40 feet wide, and 44 
feet high has an open oak roof, with separate apartments for 
study, and iron balconies running around the book-cases. 




LINCOLN S INN. 



There are in this apartment five stained glass windows, and a 
collection of valuable law books and MSS. to the number of 
25,000. 

On either side of the dais of the dining hall beneath the 
lofty oriel window in Lincoln's Inn, is a side-board for the 
upper or " benchers' " table who are the high authorities of the 
place ; the other tables are arranged in graduation, two cross- 



Lincoln's inn. 521 

wise and five along the hall for the barristers and stndcnts who 
dine here every day during term ; the average nunil)er is 200 ; 
and of those who dine on one day or another during the term 
" keeping commons," there are about 500 students. 

The new hall of Lincoln's Inn, just completed and equal to 
anything in England, is situated on the site of the old hall, be- 
tween Middle Temple Cloister and Crown Office-row. It is of 
the Perpendicular Gothic style, faced externally with Portland 
stone and internally with Bath. Tlie building projects towards 
the gardens li feet more than the old hall, which measured 70 
feet by 20 feet; the new hall being 93 feet l)y 41 feet. Its floor 
above the pavement-level, and the basement is occupied by 
the various offices recpiired for the officials. In rebuilding 
their hall, the "Benchers" have availed themselves of the oppor- 
tunity to extend and improve the domestic offices ; to provide 
commodious robing-rooms, and lavatories for the use of mem- 
bers and of students and to obtain better clerks' offices. 

New offices have also been built for the treasurer, and the 
Parliament Chamber has been increased in size. The interior 
of the hall is panelled, to the heiglit of nine feet, with a very 
handsome wainscot dado ; the panels with cinquefoil cusp 
heads, surmounted by an embattled cornice — a magnificent spec- 
imen of joiner's M'ork. The Parliament Chamber, attached to 
the hall eastward, has been considerably altered and improved 
— this is what may be called the drawing-room attached to the 
hall, where the " Benchers " retire for dessert. The kitchen 
is attached at the west end, and fitted up with the latest mod- 
ern appliances. The hall is to be heated with hot water and 
lighted M'ith sun-burners, and very handsome ornamental gas- 
brackets have also been introduced on the side walls. 

Lincoln's Inn occupied the site of the Convent of Blackfriars, 
which was built 1)V Lacy, Earl of Lincoln. Among the famous 
students of the ]\Iiddle Temple, were Edmund Burke, Bul- 
strode Whitelocke, Wycherley and Congreve, Sir William 
Blackstone, Lord Chancellors Eldon and Stowell, Richard 
Brinsley Sheridan, and Oliver Goldsmith. 

The number of students in the reign of Henry YI. Avere : 



622 THE INNS OF COURT. 

Four Inns of Court, eacli 200 — 800 ; ten Inns of Chancer}-, 
each lOo — 1000 ; total 1800. To-day there are in the four 
Inns of Court alone, 4500 students. 

In Gray's Inn lived Dr. Eawlinson, " Tom Folio " of the 
" Tatler," m-Iio stutled four chambers so full of books that he 
was compelled to sleep in the passage. 

How to become a lawyer is the only science studied in the 
Inns of Court, and the manner of doing it is as I shall describe. 
The four Inns of Court, viz : the Middle and Inner Temples, Lin- 
coln's Inn, and Gray's Inn, have exclusively the power of con- 
ferring the degree of Barrister-at-Law, requsite for practising as 
an advocate or counsel in the superior courts. Lincoln's Inn is 
generally preferred by students who contemplate the Equity Bar ; 
it being the locality of Equity Counsel and Conveyancers, and 
of Equity Courts or Courts of Chancery. If the student de- 
sign to practise the common law, either immediately as an ad- 
vocate at "Westminster, the assizes, and sessions, or as a special 
pleader (a learned person who, having kept his terms, is al- 
lowed to draw legal forms and pleadings, though not actually 
at the bar), his choice lies usually between the Inner Temple, 
the Middle Temple, and Gray's Inn, though he may adopt 
Lincoln's Inn. The Inner Temple, from its formerly insisting 
on a classical examination before admission, became more ex- 
clusive than the Middle Temple or Gray's Inn. Gray's Inn is 
numerously attended by Irish students, and has produced some 
of the greatest kuninaries at the Irish Bar, including Daniel 
O'Connell. 

To procure admission to either of these Inns, the student 
must obtain the certificate of two barristers, coupled in the 
Middle Temple with that of a Bencher, to the effect that the 
applicant is a fit person to be received into the Inn, for the 
purpose of being called to the Bar. Once admitted, the stu- 
dent has the use of the library, and is entitled to a seat in the 
church or chapel of the Inn, and to have his name set down tor 
chambers. 

lie is then required to keep " commons," by dining in the 
hall for twelve terms (four terms occur each year), on commenc- 



"dinner in hall" 523 

ing which, he must deposit -with the treasurer £100, to be re- 
tained with interest until he is " called" ; but members of the 
Universities are exempt from this deposit. The student must 
also sign a bond with sureties for the payment of his commons 
and term-fees. In all the Inns no person can be called unless he 
is above twenty-one years of age and of three years' standing as 
a student. The " call " is made by the Benchers in council ; 
after which the student becomes a barrister, and takes the 
usual oath at Westminster. In certain Inns, hoAvever, the stu- 
dent must, before his call, attend certain lectures, which are a 
revival of the old readings, witliout their festivities. 

To witness one of the " Hall Dinners " is enough to brine 
back the days of chivalry to one's mind. There is the lofty, 
grand Gothic roof, the long tables, the grace before meat, which 
is oftered by the " Reader," the magnificent windows of stained 
glass, which project a thousand varied hues on the faces of the 
students, and the grave features of the Benchers who sit aloft 
on the dais. 

At five or half-past five o'clock, the barristers, students and 
other members, in their gOM'ns, having assembled in the hall, 
the Benchers enter in procession to the dais ; the steward strikes 
the table three times, grace is said by the treasurer or senior 
Bencher present, and the dinner commences; the Benchers ob- 
serve somewhat more style at their table than the otlier mem- 
bers do at theirs ; the general repast is a tureen of soup, a joint 
of meat, a tart, and cheese, to each mess consisting of four per- 
sons ; each mess is also allowed a bottle of port-wine. The din- 
ner over, the Benchers, after grace, retire to their om'u apart- 
ments. At the Inner Temple, on May 29, a gold cup of " sack " 
is handed to each member, who drinks to the hap])}' res- 
toration of Charles 11. At Gray's Inn a similar custom pre- 
vails, but the toast is the memory of Queen Elizabeth. The 
Inner Temple Ilall waiters are called "panniers," from "pan- 
arii" who attended the Knights Templars. x\t both Temples 
the form of the dinner resembles the repasts of the military 
monks ; the Benchers on the dais representing the "knights ;" 
the barristers the "freres," or brethren; and the students, the 



524 THE INNS OF COUKT. 

" novices." The Middle Temple still bears the arms of the 
Knights Templars, viz., the figure of the Holy Lamb. 

The entrance expenses at the Inner Temple (the average of 
the costs at other Inns), are £40 lis. 5d., of which £25 Is. 3d. 
is for the stamp ; on call, £82 12s., of which £52 2s. 6d. is for 
the stamp ; total, £123 3s. The commons bill is about £12 an- 
nually. 

Of Clement's Inn in the Strand which is just the same Clem- 
ent's Inn as it was when Shakspeare lived, that poet speaks as 
follows in the second part of Henry IV.: 

Shallow. I was once of Clement's Inn, where, I think, they 
will talk of mad Shallow yet. 

Silence. You were called lusty Shallow, then, cousin. 

Shalloio. By the mass, I was called any thing; and I 
would have done any thing indeed, and roundly too. There 
was I, and little John Doit of Staffordshire, and Black George 
Barnes of Staffordshire, and Francis Pickbone, and Will 
Squele, a Cotswold man ; you had not four such swinge-buck- 
lers in all the Inns of Court again. 

Then Shallow tells of Sir John Falstaff breaking " Skogan's 
head at the court-gate when he was a crack not thus high ; and 
the very same day did I fight with one Sampson Stockfish, a 
fruiterer, behind Gray's Inn. 

Shalloiv. Oh, Sir John, do you remember since we lay all 
night in the AVindmill in St. George's Fields? 

Falstaff. AVe have heard the chimes at midnight, Master 
Shallow. 

Shallow. I remember at Mile-End Green (when I lay at 
Clement's Inn), I was then "Sir Dagonet" in Arthur's Show." 

Then Falstaff says of Shallow: "I do remember him at 
Clement's Inn, like a man made after supper of a cheese- 
paring." 

Before a student can enter an Inn of Court and eat his 
first dinner, he must deposit £100 as security that he will pay 
for the rest of his dinners. No student is allowed to keep a 
" term " unless he has been three days in " hall " when grace 
is said at dinner. 



IRISH STUDEXTS. 



525 



No person in trade or in deacon's orders, or one who has 
been a conveyancer's clerk, can be admitted at all, so strict are 
the rules. No gentleman can be called to the bar by any of these 
Inns which are corporate and chartered bodies, before having 
been a member or student of his Inn for five years, unless that 
he is a Bachelor of Laws, or a Master of Arts of the Univer- 
sities of Oxford, Dublin, or Cambridge, when three years is 
the period required. No one can be calle.d to the bar until his 
name and description have been put up on the screen in the 
hall of the Inn to which he belongs for a fortnight previous to 
his call, and communicated to all the other societies. 

Irish students must keep eight terms in one of the English 
Inns, as well as nine in the King's Inns, Dublin, before they 
can be called to the Irish bar. 

Irish students may keep terms in London and Dublin alter- 
nately, or in any other order they may think proper. Gray's 
Inn is the favorite Inn of Irish students, for the reason that 
discipline is not so strict as in the Inner or Middle Temple, or 
Lincoln's Inn, and, besides, no charge is made for " absent 
commons," or being away from the dinners, while in the 
other Inns the student is charged for his meals in any case. 





CHAPTER XXXVII. 

THE BANK OF ENGLAND AND THE MINT. 

HE Bank of England is the greatest moneyed 
institution in the world. It is situated in 
the very heart of the City of London, op- 
posite the Royal Exchange and the Mansion 
House, and is composed of an insulated 
mass of stone buildings and courts cover- 
ing four acres of ground, bounded by Prin- 
ces's street, west ; Lothbury, north ; Bartholomew Lane, east ; 
and Threadneedle street, south. Its exterior measurements 
are 365 feet south, 410 feet north, 245 feet east, and 440 feet 
west. 

"Within this area are nine open courts, a magnificent Rotunda, 
numerous public offices, court and committee rooms, an ar- 
mory, engraving and printing offices, a library, apartments for 
officers' servants, beadles, detectives, porters, and messengers. 
During the No-Popery riots of 1780, the Bank was attacked 
by the mob, when Wilkes rushed out of the building and seized 
some of the ringleaders. The Bank was defended by the reg- 
ulars, the City Volunteers, and the Clerks of tlie establish- 
ment, who melted their leaden inkstands into bullets. For 
ninety years since tliat terrible night, the bank has been 
guarded by a company of foot soldiers, detailed in regular rota- 
tion from the Horse Guards, under command of one officer, 
for whom a sumptuous table is set every night, with the privi- 
lege of inviting two friends, while servants are provided for 
him. 



THE BANK ESTABLISHED. 527 

In the political tumult of November, 1830, provisions were 
made at the Bank for a state of siege, and when the Chartists 
made their great demonstrations in 1848, the roof of the Bank 
was fortified by a company of sappers and miners, cannon were 
planted, and a strong garrison held every court and passage 
in the interior. 

The number of clerks and porters and other employees who 
are retained by the Bank, is one thousand or more, and their 
salaries amount to half a million of pounds, or two and a half 
millions of dollars annually. 

In 1808 an arrangement was made by the English Govern- 
ment with the Bank, by which the latter undertook the man- 
agement of the English national Debt, at a rate of £340 for 
each million of the debt up to 600 millions of pounds, and 
X300 for every additional million. 

The Bank of England was established (1694) chiefly by Mr. 
"William Paterson, the projector of the Scotch Colony of Daricn, 
who commenced by founding a National Bank, 1091. To carry 
on tlie war with France (1694) Government required a loan 
of XI, 200,000, and imposed new taxes, expected to yield a 
million and a half. The subscribers to the loan were incor- 
porated under the title of the Governor and Company of the 
Bank of England, and empowered to buy land, to deal in gold 
and silver, and in bills of exchange. The interest on the loan 
was 8 per cent., besides which Government agreed to pay 
£4,000 a year for the cost of management, or £100,000 
in all. 

In the vicinity of the Bank of England there is a dense 
ti-affic, and it is necessary that suitable provender should be 
found for tlie large number of bankers and bankers' clerks, 
wlio, living in cosy little villas at Brompton, Paddington, and 
Maida Hill, and are comixilled to eat their warm lunches in tlie 
city during business hours. 

The Poultry, Bucklersbury, King William, Prince and Lead- 
enhall streets, are lined with tliese comfortable, pleasant looking 
eating-liouses and dining-rooms, where the moneyed men and 
their smart looking clerks sit back in easy little boxes, with 



528 



THE BANK OF ENGLAND AND THE MINT. 



turtle soup, salad, and juicy rump steaks before tliem,aiid long 
necked wine bottles in ice coolers between their feet, chatting 
about stocks and Change and Turkish Loans. 

In the i)arlor lob])y of the Bank is a portrait of ^Ir. David 
Race, who wi\s in the service of the institution over fifty years, 
during wlych tijne he amassed a fortune of £200,000. 



rp4>^^? 




BANKERS EATING HOUSE. 



The Bullion Office, on tlie western side of the Bank, con- 
sists of a public chamber and two vaults — one for the open 
deposit of bullion free of charge, unless weighed, the other foi*' 
the private stock of the Bank. 

Here are employed a Principal, Deputy Principal, Clerk, As- 
sistant Clerk, and porters. 

The gold is kept in solid bars, each bar weigliing 16 pounds 
and valued at X800, or ^4,000, and the silver in pigs and bars, 
while the dollars are kept in bags. 

The value of the gold in the vaults of the Bank in 1869 was 



LEDGERS AND MONEY-BAGS. 529 

about twenty millions of pounds, or one hundred millions of 
dollars. 

One day I received an order wliicli was sent me l)y a friend, 
giving me full authority to visit the Bank of England. I liad 
not a little curiosity to satisfy, and accordingly I arrived at the 
Bank as early as eleven o'clock in the day. 

Passing through the central entrance, wliich is opposite the 
Mansion House, I found myself in a spacious court Avell flag- 
ged, and liere were two boxes in whicli sat a brace of Old Jewry 
detectives, who are on duty in this spot from one end of the 
year to tlie other. These men receive gratuities from the Bank 
beside tlieir regular pay. Tliere were also in tlic yard two big 
fat beadles in red coats and leggings, their garments being cov- 
ered with tinsel. These fat, logy looking fellows are tlic footmen 
of the Bank, who are employed to watch for suspicious strangers 
and to guide any visitors who may come. 

While an attendant was reading the order which I handed 
him, I could hear the musical jingle of sovereigns and silver 
coins, being rattled up and down in the interior of the building. 

I was taken by the guide into a large vaulted room with a 
cupola, in which were a perfect army of clerks, some young 
and brisk, others old, gray, and ponderous, ranged in long 
rows behind the desks, making up accounts, weighing gold and 
paying it over the counters, or writing in huge ledgers. 

Outside the circular railings, which run all around this very 
large room, were stationed a vast crowd of depositors, men 
and women, or persons drawing money in gold or silver. Con- 
tinually from the throats of tlie clerks arose the words : 

*' How will you have it. Gold or silver ? Sovereigns or 
halves?" 

Here is a lady who has traveled very far, perhaps, for her divi- 
dends. Slie has taken a seat and a number of curious eyes 
are gazing at her as she slowly takes a wing of a chicken and 
a piece of snowy white bread from a napkin and connncnces to 
eat, in the midst of all this wealth and confusion of the richest 
city in the world. 

The number of ledgers and account books behind these bars 



530 THE BANK OP ENGLAND AND THE MINT. 

are enough to frighten one. When the day's business is done 
all these huge books are stowed away by the porters in tlie fire- 
proof room under ground, and brought up again in tlic morn- 
ing, for they are fully as valuable as the large sums inscribed 
on their leaves. 

Machinery has been perfected so that these bulky account 
books may be hoisted and lowered every day. 

Look at that young man with his banking case chained under 
his arm ; the rolls of checks and notes he holds in his hands 
will probably amount to tliousands of pounds ; he catches the 
eyes of one of the clerks, calls out the amount, hands the 
bulky bundle over the brass mounted railing and quits the 
room, leaving the sum to be counted over at leisure. 

See how carelessly the casluer handles that heavy bag of 
gold ; he has no time to count it, but throws it into the scale 
as a coal heaver would a sack of coals — so long as it is right 
weight, that's all he cares about ; he then shoots it into his 
large drawer and throws the bag aside as if he did not mind 
whether a sovereign stuck in the bag or not. 

He counts sovereigns by twos and threes at a time ; you feel 
confident that he must have given you either too many or too 
few, he appears so negligent ; you count them, and there they 
are quite correct, and no mistake whatever. 

The guide says to me : " Sometimes, Sir, the clerks are 
kept in the Bank for hours when there's a sixpence wrong in 
the balance, and they have to go over and over the books until 
they make the sixpence right. It's awful work, to have to go 
over them long columns of figures and no chance of getting 
away until everything is correct." 

" Was there ever any great forgery committed on tlie Bank?" 
I asked the guide, who seemed to be a very intelligent man, 
having been in the Bank forty years. 

" Ah, yes Sir, there was two great ones. In old times a great 
many men were hanged for forging Bank of England notes. 
In one year, I think it was 1820, there was over a hundred per- 
sons convicted of forgery, and nearly nine hundred were con- 
victed for having forged notes in their pockets. Why, Sir, 



THE GREAT PANIC OF 1825. 531 

when I was a boy I remember as many as twenty-four hanged 
in one year for forgery on the Bank, I tliink the year was 
1818. In 1803 there was a great forgery, committed by Mr. 
Astlett, who was one of the chief cashiers of the Bank. The 
amount Avas so large it frightened every body. Astlett done 
liis work so well, by re-issuing Exchequer bills, that he de- 
frauded the Bank out of £320,000 before they knew it. You 
may imagine what a row there was when it was found out. 
The old Governor nearly went mad." 

" Was any other great forgery ever attempted ?" said I, 
curious to hear those details of forgotten crime. 

"Oh yes Sir," said the old man," "the biggest forgery of 
all was Fauntleroy's, in 1816, that was a great deal bigger than 
Astlett's, for it was for .£360,000, and the way of it was this : 
You see Mr. Fauntleroy was the head partner of a bank in 
Berners street that had dealing with the Bank of England, and 
the bank tliat he belonged to was in a bad state, so what does 
Fauntleroy do to keep up its credit, but he goes to work quite 
cooly and forges powers of attorney of a lot of nobs and he 
sells out their funds, and all the time he was a-working in the 
dark this way, he wos a payin' of the divydends to them. Then 
the crash came at last, and before he was caught, when the 
police broke into his house, they found a note and on the note 
was written : — 

'• The Bank first began to refuse to discount our acceptances, 
and to destroy tlie credit of our house ; and by G — d the Bank 
shall smart for it." 

" So, that's the way he did it, but he was hanged for it, and 
I saw him swing. I never saw so many people in my life as 
was at that hanging. All London was there, Sir, and when he 
got off the cart you would have thought he was going to a 
party, he was so blessed cool." 

There was a " Great Panic " in the Bank of England in De- 
cember, 1825, caused by the redemption of interest on X215,- 
000.000 of stock held by the public. The Bank of England 
was acting as banker for the Nation, and offered to advance 
money to holders of stock to pay off" their principal investment. 



532 THE BANK OP ENGLAND AND THE MINT. 

This was an era of mad speculation, and no less than £372,- 
000,000 was invested in all kinds of bogus stock projects. In 
some of these schemes shares of £100 on which only £5 had 
been paid, rose to a premium of £40, yielding a profit of eight 
times the amount of money paid. Everything went merry as 
a marriage bell for a time, and large sums had been withdrawn 
from the Bank of England, reducing the gold in its vaults from 
£8,750,000, in October, 1824, to £8,624,320 in February, 
1825. 

The panic began on tlie 5th of December, 1825, when a 
London bank failed, at which the agency of above forty country 
banks was transacted, and such a re-action was the necessary 
result of the previous madness of speculation. Lombard street, 
and the vicinity of the Bank, were filled with excited men and 
women, who were waiting eagerly to withdraw their investments. 
Next day, a number of other banks failed. The rush on the 
Bank of England was terrific, but the clerks kept paying away 
gold in bags of twenty-five sovereigns each. From nine until 
five, each day, twenty-five clerks were engaged, counting out 
gold, and as it would take that number of clerks to count out 
£50,000 in sovereigns, if counted by hand, a plan was made 
by which the tellers counted 25 sovereigns into one scale and 
25 into another, and if the scales balanced, they continued until 
there were 200 sovereigns in each scale. In this way £1,000 
were paid out in a few minutes, the weight of one thousand 
sovereigns being 21 pounds, while 512 bank notes only weigh 
one pound. Li this way £307,000, in gold, was paid out in 
nine hours to the clamorous people. 

Instead of contracting their issues the Directors of the Bank 
boldly extended them. In one day they discounted 4,200 bills. 
December 8th, the discounts at the Bank amounted to £7,- 
500,000 ; on the 15th, they were £11,500,000, and on the 
29th, £15,000,000. December 3d, the circulation of the Bank 
was £17,500,000, and the day before Christmas, December 
24th, it was £25,500,000, or, $127,500,000. Any kind of 
paper that was not absolutely worthless, was discounted. Tre- 
mendous advances on deposits of bills of exchange were made 



THE PANIC CEASES. 



533 



bjthc Bank, stock "was entered as security, and exchequer hills 
were purchased. The gallant old institution weatliered the 
storm, and, on the 2Gth of December, gold began to come in 
slowly. During the latter part of tlie panic week a forgotten box 
of one-pound notes, containing X700,000, was discovered, and 
these were immediately issued, and the Directors acknowledged 
that the forgotten box saved the commercial credit of the Bank 
and of England. There was only £001,000 in bullion and 
.£426,000 in coin when the rush stopped. In February, 1797, 
when the Bank suspended cash payments, there was £1,086,- 
170 in coin and bullion remaining in the vaults. 

I saw, in a glass case, a bank note for one million of pounds 




THE BANK OP ENGLAND. 



(canceled,) which had passed between the Bank and the 
government in some transaction or another. Think of it, a 
piece of paper five by two and a half inches in size, which was 
33 



634 TUB BANK OP ENGLAND AND THE MINT. 

good on its face any place in tlic world for Five Millions op 
Dollars. I saw also here, several other bank bills for large 
amounts, such as ten, fifty, one hundred, and two hundred and 
fifty thousand pounds each. These were the most valuable 
strips of printed paper I ever saw. 

It must be recollected, that inside of the walls of the Bank of 
England, which covers four acres, as I have observed, every- 
thing is made, excepting the |)aper of which the bank notes are 
manufactured. The gold, of course, is coined in the Mint on 
Tower Hill, but everything else is done inside of the Bank 
walls, including paper staining, engraving, making the steel 
plates from wliicli the notes are transferred, and other useful 
arts. Printer's ink is also made, the ink having to be of a 
peculiar shade so as to prevent counterfeiting. Tlien there 
are book binderies, where the ledgers and accounts are bound, 
and a number of other rooms devoted to various })urposes. 

It is a noticeable fact, that every Bank official whom we 
meet on our journey through all these lofty apartments, halls 
and saloons, wears full evening dress though it is not yet noon- 
day. Swallow-tail coats, white neck-cloths, and white vests, of 
'the most spotless hues, seem to be the Bank uniform. 

And what ])leasant surprises there are in this institution. 
Now the guide leading, and 1 following, we emerge into au 
open court-yard, of very good size, which has lawns, shrubberies, 
and dainty lit:tle grass j)lots, with the most cheering flower- 
beds, the colors of which are very refreshing to the eye. Here 
are well-shaded and sanded paths, and lofty, leafy trees, and 
all these rural delights are concentrated in a space of one 
and a half acres, the dimensions of the grounds walled in by 
the Bank. Here, in the heart of mighty London, is a green 
oasis, like a diamond set in a pig's nose. 

These detached buildings, with white steps leading to their 
doors, and neatly-ornamented porticoes, are the residences of 
the Governor and Directors, and here they liold receptions, and 
levees, and the questions and inquiries of angry stockholders 
are heard and answered at quarterly meetings. The guide asks 
me if " 1 would like to see the workshops of the Bank." I 



MAKING INK FOR BANK NOTES. 535 

agree at once to his proposition, and on ascending a flight of 
narrow stone steps, we find ourselves in a large room which is 
used by the Bank mechanics to prepare the steel plates upon 
which the Bank notes are engraved. 

A very powerful steam engine, which is used for other me- 
chanical and artistic purposes in the Bank, is the motive power 
by which the work is done in this room. I can hear the sharp 
steel wedge scraping and polishing the already bright sheets 
of steel, and the noise is a most disagreeable one. All the 
workman has to do, however, is simply to place the plate and 
spindle in the exact spot, when the machine, like a stroke of 
vengeance seizes it, and in a second it is bright as silver. 

Now we are in the room in which the printer's ink is manu- 
factured with which the Bank notes are printed. The ink has 
to be of a very peculiar black shade, as counterfeiting would 
be easy were the materials used to be the same as in other inks. 
Masses of black matter are being ground into a fine powder 
by rollers,! think that the guide told me it was nutgalls; large 
lumps are placed beneath the rollers, the cylinder revolves, and 
the powder is crushed to a fine paste. 

The guide says, " If there's a bit of sand left in the paste, 
why then the grinding hasn't been done right." The rollers 
are of strong steel, and the smallest substance would be ground 
under them. A grain of sand will cause the two rollers as they 
meet to recede from each other, so sensitive are they to the 
finest hard substance. 

Now we are out in a court again and we can see the engine 
room, and the huge coal fires burning, and the big boiler 
sweltering and steaming away at a great rate. The man who ' 

I attends the engine is in his shirt-sleeves, and a little black- 
ened, and I believe that, not excepting the Beadle, this was 
the only man whom I saw inside of the Bank who was not in 

ifull dress. 

Here is a large room where the Bank-paper is cut to the 

I proper size for notes, and a thousand pound note is exactly the 

' 3ame size as one for five pounds, which is the smallest denom- 

, nation issued by the Bank. 



636 THE BANK OP ENGLAND AND THE MINT. 

Then there is the room for the compositors and binders, and 
in the latter apartment, all the account books which the vast 
business of the Bank make necessary, are paged, lined, and 
bound. Of ledgers alone, one thousand are used yearly, in 
this fountain head of finance, and check books innmnerable 
are also printed and bound here. 

Now I am again in the court-yard, which is paved very 
neatly — ^but no, I have not been here before. This fact I re- 
cognize as I look around me. Tliis another court yard. 

" This is the " Library, Sir," said the guide. 

I began to think that the Bank officials were indeed a very 
literary set of people, who could find time in business hours to 
read books, but I was presently made aware of my mistake. 

The guide knocks quietly at a small iron door, which re- 
volves on its hinges with a noise, and a man in that same inev- 
itable dress-coat, cravat, and neck-tie, opens the door, and I 
gain an entrance to a place which looks to me very like the 
casemate of a Monitor, or a sally-port in a stone fortress. Iron 
doors, iron hinges, and iron windows, shaped in a circular form, 
and embayed in the wall, are the most significant signs around 
me. 

Although it is broad daylight outside, there is utter darkness 
within, but for the single gas jet which burns as if suffer- 
ing from some defect in the pipe. 

I feel that some mystery is to be explained, or some strange 
sight shown me — or else why tliis change from sunlight to this 
cribbed and dungeon-like casemate. 

It would be impossible to break into this room ; and to get 
out of it, if the doors were locked, would be equally difficult, I 
imagine. 

Now the gentleman who has opened the door goes behind an 
iron railing, and says : 

" This is the Library of the Bank, Sir, and these are the vol- 
umes that compose the Library," he says to the writer, at the 
same time taking a large package of notes from a shelf — on 
which there arc many hundred packages of like description — 
" we keep here the canceled notes which are called in, and 



IN THE VAULTS. 537 

therefore they can never be used again. "We keep tliese old 
notes for twenty-five years, in case a forgery has been committed, 
and when it becomes necessary to produce the notes for evi- 
dence — why, licrc thoy arc — we have notes here for millions 
of pounds," said he, turning over bundle after bundle of ragged 
looking papers, that had once been of incalculable value. 

These notes, after a certain time, arc reduced to pulp, and 
again are made into paper, from which in turn fresli bank notes 
are made, so that these old rags have the property which 
Ponce de Leon's fountain gave, of renewing their youth. 

Into another room now, where the notes are printed from 
tlie plates, and to insure honesty in the printer — the machine 
registers the number of each note printed — the registering 
being done in a distant part of the establishment. 

And now we are in the Vaults, where the precious metals 
are kept, and where I saw and handled riches such as would 
have bewildered Pizzaro, or Cortez, even in their wildest im- 
aginings. 

Here arc the Bullion Vaults, in which are kept bars of gold 
and silver. The gold bars weigh sixteen pounds each, while 
the silver bar varies. 

The Bank pays for gold seventy-eight shillings an ounce, 
while silver is generally valued at about five shillings and two 
pence an ounce. 

It is enough to dazzle the eyes of a miser, or render him 
blind, to look at the show of gold bars piled up behind the 
railings, in those large glass presses. Thousands of them! 
And they are piled up just as I have often seen the stacks of 
solder in a plumber or gas-fitter's shop in America, without any 
seeming care as to how they are laid. 

Here a couple of men entered with kegs, and oie of them, 
stepping up to me, asks : 

" Would you like to handle a large sum of money, Sir ?" 

" I don't care if I do," I said ; and the very polite gentleman 
went to a safe in the corner and opening one of the mimcrous 
black doors of iron which ornament every portion of the room, 



538 



THE BANK OF ENGLAND AND THE MINT. 



he brought forth four medium sized packages, and laid them on 
the counter before me, saying : 

" Please to hold open your liand. Now, Sir, there are four 
packages of Bank of England notes, all ready for delivery, 
and in each package is one million of pounds." 

I began to perspire and lose my sight and hearing. " Can 
there be," I said, " so much money in the world?" and then I 
heard him say again : 

" Please to examine the 
packages — one — two — 
three — -fouj' — millions.'^ 

I cried out, " stop, stop — 
give me breath— do you 
mean to say," said I, " that 
there are four million of 
pounds in these four 
packages — tiventy million 
of dollars ?" 

" That is what I mean," 
said the polite official, 
and he smiled slightly at 
the excitement which he 
saw in my features. 

At that moment I did 
not envy C. A'^anderbilt, 
and I dcs})ised Jim Fisk. 
Dim thoughts of mur- 
der flashed across my 
brain — and yet, no — I banislied it from my mind. Twenty 
million of dollars ! But then, the Tower ! Ha-ha — away, fell 
design. 

In one week the issue of bank notes amount to twcnty-fivc 
million of pounds, or one hundred and twenty-five million of 
dollars. During the last twelve months the Bank has purchased 
three million and a half pounds' worth of gold bars, and one 
million eight hundred pounds' woi-th of silver bars. Dm-ing the 




"l BEGAN TO PEUSriRE." 



MAKING SOVEREIGNS. 539 

same period it sold six million pounds' worth of gold bars, 
and a quarter of a million pounds' worth of silver" bars. 

In the Weighing Office, established in 1842, to detect light 
gold, is the ingenious macliine invented by Mr. W. Cotton, 
then Deputy-Governor of the Bank. About 80 or 100 light 
and heavy sovereigns are placed indiscriminately in a round 
tube ; as they descend on the machinery beneath, tliosc whicli 
are light receive a slight touch, which moves them into their 
proper receptacle, and those which are of legitimate weight pass 
into their appointed place. The light coins are then defaced 
by a machine, 200 in a minute ; and by the weighing-machinery 
35,000 may be weighed in one day. There are six of these ma- 
cliines, whicli from 1844 to 1849 weighed upwards of 48,000,000 
pieces witliout any inaccuracy. The average amount of gold 
tendered in one year is nine millions, of which more than a 
quarter is light. The silver is put up into bags, each of one 
hundred pounds value, and the gold into bags of a thousand ; 
and then these bagsful of bidliou are sent through a strongly 
guarded door, or rather window, into the Treasury, a dark, 
gloomy apartment, fitted up with iron presses, supplied witli 
huge locks and bolts. 

And now I was to behold the process. After leaving the 
Treasury A-aults, where I was shown the Bank notes, I was 
taken to a very large room on an upper floor, in which was a 
small and elegant steam engine, with other intricate machines, 
for weighing and defacing, or marking coins. 

There was a large table with a number of coin shovels, and 
its entire surface was covered with sovereigns, heaped a foot 
high, the tii))le having a raised rim all around it. 

They were weighing these sovereigns — these officials with 
the finely starched shirts and white neck-ties ; and this was the 
maimer of it : 

There were two open square boxes, which had connections 
with a number of wheels and revolving cylindei"S, and from 
each of these boxes projected the mouth of a scoop or highly 
polished funnel. A roll of sovereigns passed into this box, 
sliding slowly down through the mouth, and thence into a 
larger box below on the floor. 



540 THE BANK OF ENGLAND AND THE MINT. 



n 



The attendants fill the tubes, and at the lower end of the 
scoop the work is done. Whenever a sovereign of light weight 
touches this spot in the lower part of the tube, a small brass 
plate jumps out and jiushes the light sovereign into the left- 
hand aperture, while the full-Avcight pieces drop without hin- 
drance into tlic right-hand box. Tlic small brass pltite does 
the business very quietly. 

The light sovereigns are then gathered, placed in a bag, and 
sent back to the Mint to be re-coincd. The man who was work- 
ing the machine pulled a crank and a number, perhaps a thou- 
sand, of these marked sovereigns fell into the box. I took 
some of them in ni}* hand, and found them almost totally de- 
faced, and a number had been slit in two halves by tlic pro- 
cess, but no gold dust is lost the operation is performed so 
cleanly. 

On the very same spot where once stood the Monastery of 
the Cistercian !Monks, or Gray Friars, the Royal Mint of Eng- 
land is now located, and here all the money in use in England 
is coined by tlie "■ Company of Moneycrs," as they are called. 
The building is situated on Tower Hill, the Mint having for a 
thousand years been carried on in tlie Tower itself. 

For many hundreds of years the coinage of England had 
been debased by succeeding money-makers, who were entrusted 
by tlie Kings with the coinage, and in the reign of King Ed- 
ward I, 280 Jews, of both sexes, were charged by this monarch 
with having debased the silver and gold coins, and were hung 
in London for the ofTence. King John, in 1212, ordered all 
the prisoners in his custody, among whom were some ecclesi- 
astics, to be brought before him for instant judgment, at the 
same time summoning Cardinal Pandulph, the Papal Legate, 
to appear also to witness the judgment. Pandulph appeared, 
and King John thinking to frighten tliat haughty prelate who 
had often humbled him, ordered a priest among the prisoners, 
who had counterfeited money, to be hanged. 

Pandulph stepped forward and said : 

" Lord King, who so dares lay finger on yon clerk, though 



HENRY VIII A COUNTERFEITER. 541 

he were of royal blood, him shall I excommunicate, and lie 
shall be anathema of Holy Church." 

Pandulph, who was indeed a very energetic person, left the 
apartment to get a candle, so that he miglit curse John in due 
form, and the King having been thoroughly frightened, deliv- 
ered the priest to Pandul{)h to have that prelate do justice on 
him, but the legate immediately liberated the offender. 

During the reign of the Saxon Edgar, the penny had become 
scarcely equal to a half-penny in weight, and St. Dunstan, who 
was a bishop and confessor to the King, became so outraged 
at the debasement of the coinage, that on "Whit-Sunday he re- 
fused to celebrate the mass before the King until justice had 
been done on three officials, or as they were called " moneyers." 
They were at once taken out of the Church and had their right 
hands struck off by order of the King. 

In those days even the gold coins were of square, longitudi- 
nal, and all sorts of irregular and uncouth shapes. 

One of the prophecies of the Sage Merlin was to the effect that 
when the money of England should become round, the Pi-ince 
of Wales would be crowned in London. Edward I, having as- 
certained that such a prophecy was believed among the Welsh 
peopl3, caused the head of their last native Prince, Llewellyn, to 
be cut off and sent to the Tower in London, where it was 
crowned with willows in mockery of the prophecy, and since 
then no native Welshman has held the title of Prince of Wales, 
with England's consent. 

Henry VIII, among his many acts of scoundrelism, was 
guilty of debasing the coinage of his kingdom, and when liis 
illegitimate daughter, Queen Elizabeth, called in £038,000 of 
silver and gold money for the purix)se of re-coining it, s'lc as- 
certained on going to tlie Mint in person, (where she coined 
with her own hands several ])ieces of money,) that these monies, 
whose current value on the face had been .£038,000, Avcrc then 
only worth in reality £244,000. 

On the day that George the Third's first son and successor 
was born — afterwards George lY — the captured treasure of 
the Spanish vessel "Hermione," amounting to sixty-fivo tons 



542 THE BANK OP ENGLAND AND THE MINT. 

of silver and one bag full of gold, was carried in triumphant 
procession through the streets of London — amid tlie acclama- 
tion of the citizens — borne by twenty wagons. The value of 
the treasure was one million of pounds. This money was 
taken to the Mint to be coined. 

In 1804 the English Government having determined to de- 
clare war against Spain, some private parties under the leader- 
ship of a Captain Moore, fitted out four ships to intercept 
some Spanish vessels on their way home from the Indies with 
treasure, and this infamous act of piracy was i)crformed before 
the capturers of the Spanish galleons had heard of the impend- 
ing declaration of war, and in fact before war was declared. 

Some hundreds of persons were blown up in the Spanish 
Admiral's vessel, and one rich Spanish merchant who was re- 
turning on one of the vessels with his wife and daughters — 
having accumulated a great fortune — lost their lives by this act 
of treachery. 

In 1804 the ransom payable to the British Government from 
the Chinese Nation, amounting to sixty-five tons of silver, or 
two millions of Chinese dollars, the price which China had to 
pay for not taking her opium quietly, was brought home and 
transferred to the Mint to be coined. 

The money })aid by France to Charles II of England for the 
town of Dunkirk, an immense treasure, was spent by that 
monarch in the worst kind of debauchery, and the face of 
Britannia which remains to this day upon English coiiis, is the 
likeness of Miss Frances Stewart, afterward Duchess of Rich- 
mond, and at one time a mistress of this dissolute King. 

Guineas, which are valued at twenty-one shillings, while the 
sovereign is valued at a pound or twenty shillings, were first 
coined from the gold brought by the African Company from 
Guinea, and the coins had an clei)hant stamiwd on them. 

In the same reign were struck the five guinea, the two guinea 
piece and the half guinea pieces. The coinage of this mon- 
arch's reign, who was only fitted to be the keeper of a bagnio, 
was so much depreciated, that in the reign of William and 
Mary, when 572 bags of silver coin were called in of Charles 



HOW TO MAKE MONEY. S'lS 

IPs reign, it was found to weigh only 9,480 pounds, although 
the proper weight should have been 18,450 pounds. 

The gold quarter guinea was coined by George I, and this 
coin is remarkable for bearing for the first time the letters 
" F. D." {Fidei Defensor,) or " Defender of the Faith." George 
III, an old blockhead as the First George was an old black- 
guard, coined seven shilling pieces, but these have been with- 
drawn, as have also the guineas and half guineas, which are 
now replaced by the sovereign, half sovereign, and crown, 
which latter coin is valued at five shillings. 

When the bad money of Henry VIII was called in, the 
workmen in the Mint declared that it contained arsenic, and 
many of them "became sick to death with the savor." For 
this sickness some venerable idiot ordered them to drink from 
dead men's skulls, and a warrant was actually obtained where- 
by the heads of several Catholic priests, which then decorated 
London Bridge, were taken down and drinking cups were made 
from them for the workmen. 

The present building in use by the Company of Moneyers 
for a Mint, was erected in 1811 on Tower Hill, and cost with 
the construction of machinery two hundred and fifty thousand 
pounds. In one hundred thousand poiuids worth of gold bars 
are sent into the Mint one morning, on the next they will be 
ready for delivery in sovereigns. 

The gold is melted in pots made of black lead, which will 
not break in annealing, and then the alloy of copper is added 
(to gold one part in twelve ; to silver eighteen pennyweights 
to a pound) , and the mixed metal cast into small bars. The bars 
then in a heated state are first passed through the rollers, which 
are of tremendous power, these reducing them to one fourth 
of their former thickness and increasing them proportionally in 
length Then the sheets of metal arc passed through the cold 
rollers, which laminates them to the required thickness of coin. 

Now comes the work of tlie cutting-out machines. There 
arc fifteen of these elegant engines in the same basement, set 
apart for them. 

The bars having been cut into the required strips and thick- 



544 THE BANK OP ENGLAND AND THE MJNT. 

ncsSjthe protecting rim is next raised in tlic " Marking Room,'* 
and after blanching and annealing, they are ready for coining. 

There are twelve presses for this purpose, each of which 
makes a hundred strokes a minute, and at each stroke, above 
and below, a blank is made into a perfect coin, stamped on both 
sides and milled at the edge, each press coining about ten thou- 
sand pieces of money in one hour. One little boy is alone 
needed to feed a press with blanks. 

The coin is tested before the Lord Chancellor or Chancellor 
of the Exchequer and a jury of twelve goldsmiths, who are 
sworn to give a fair judgment, once a year — this being a trial 
between tlie Company of Coiners and the Government who 
own the coin. In a late trial of two hundred pounds weight 
of gold coin, the bulk weighed just one pennyweight and fifteen 
grains less than was correct — ^which is pretty good workman- 
ship. 

In a period of eighteen years the amount of money coined 
by tl;c Company was as follows : 

Gold, ^55,000,000 

Silver, 12,000,000 

Copper, 250,000 



Total, .... X67,250,000 
Profit to the Company for coinage of above amount X 214,000. 
Amount charged for coining .£67,250,000 — ^by the Company 
of Moneyers— .£421,000. 





CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

' THE BRIDGES OF LONDON. 

ONDOlSr may well be proud of her 
bridges. Fifteen of the finest struc- 
tures of their kind in the world 
span with mighty and enduring 
arches, the surface of the Thames ; 
in a distance of seven miles on the 
river from London Bridge, to the 
Suspension Bridge, at Hammer- 
smith. Paris alone can rival London 
in her super-aqueous structures, but in massiveness and gran- 
deur there is no bridge covering the Seine, and having such a 
magnificent roadway and arches as Waterloo Bridge. 

Of all the bridges which span the Thames, none have a history 
like that of London Bridge ; although the present structure 
dates only from 1825. The history of old London Bridge is 
that of Loudon itself, for the bridge was coeval with the over- 
throw of the Saxon dynasty, and the death of Richard Coeur 
de Lion. 

The first bridge erected on the site of the present London 
Bridge, was a wooden one by Ethelred III., in 994, and the 
tolls were paid by boats bringing fish to " Bylingsgate," which 
was then a water-gate of the city. The next bridge here was 
constructed by the pious brothers of St. Mary, Southwark, 
which house was originally a convent, established by a young 
girl named Mary, daughter to a ferryman, who plied at this 
point, and from the profits of the ferry the bridge was con- 



548 THE BRIDGES OF LONDON. 

strueted. This bridge was almost totally aestroyed Dy the 
Norwegian King Olave in 1008, and was rebuilt by Canute in 
1016, swept away by a flood 1091, rebuilt 1007, burnt 1136, 
and a new one was erected of elm timber in 1163 by Peter, a 
priest and chaplain of St. Mary's, Colechurch, in the Poultry. 

This bridge did not satisfy the pious architect, however, and 
he began with great zeal to build a stone one, the first in 
England, a little to the Avestward of the timber bridge in 1176, 
when Henry II. gave toward the construction the proceeds of 
a tax on wool, from which originated the saying, "London 
Bridge was built on woolpacks," a phrase that has often been 
taken in its literal meaning. Priest Peter died in 1205 and 
the bridge was finished in 1209. 

This bridge consisted of a stone platform 026 feet long, and 
40 feet wide, standing about 60 feet above the level of the 
water, and comprehended a draw bridge and nineteen pointed 
arches, with massive piers raised upon strong oak and elm piles 
covered by thick planks bolted together, so that after all, the 
famous stone bridge had a wooden platform. There was a 
gate-house, with turrets and battlements at either end, and 
toward the centre, on the east side, was built a beautiful gothic 
chapel of stone to the memory of St. Thomas (a Becket), of Can- 
terbury. In a crypt of the chapel was placed a stone tomb 
over the body of Priest Peter, the founder of the bridge. This 
bridge, in the time of Elizabeth, is described as having "sump- 
tuous buildings, and stately and beautiful houses on either side," 
making one continuous street from end to end and having an 
archway under the houses and dwellings through which 
vehicles, sedan-chairs, and pedestrians passed. The river 
could be seen at intervals in the gaps of masonry, and, in tact, 
this bridge was as much of a thoroughfare and causeway besides, 
having all the characteristics of a street on solid ground, as 
any open space in London. Some of the buildings had shops 
and beer-houses in the lower stories. 

The chronicles of this stone bridge during six centuries, 
form, perhaps, the most interesting episodes in the history of 
London. The scenes of fire, siege, insurrection, and popu- 



GRnnsriNG skulls. 549 

lar vengeance, of national rejoicing, and of tlie pageant victo- 
ries of man and of death, of fonie or funeral, which have trans- 
pired on and about the bridge, it were vain for me to attempt 
to describe. In 1212, four years after the completion of the 
structure, a terrific conflagration took place on the bridge, and 
3000 persons perished in the flames, both ends being on fire at 
the same time. Do Montfort repulsed Henry III., on this 
bridge, and the populace attacked and stoned his Queen in her 
barge as she prepared to shoot the bridge. Wat Tj-ler, the pop- 
ular rebel entered London by this road to be struck down by 
Sir William AVahvorth in 1381. Richard II. was received here 
by the citizens in 1392. In 1415 Henry V., fresh from Agin- 
court, passed the bridge, and seven years after his corpse was 
carried over it to be buried at AVestminster Abbey. In 1450 
Jack Cade attempted to storm London Bridge, but he was de- 
feated and his head placed on a pole over the gate-house. In 
1477 the Bastard of Falconbridge attacked the bridge, and fired 
several houses. In 1554 Sir Thomas Wyatt crossed the bridge 
at the head of 2000 men, to dethrone Queen Mary, and lost his 
head for it. In 1632 more than one-third of the houses 
on the bridge were destroyed by fire, and in 1666 the 
whole labyrinth of dM'ellings, shops, and edifices, were 
swept away by the Great Fire ; the entire street being rebuilt 
within twenty years after. The houses were entirely removed 
and parapets and balustrades were erected on each side in 
1732, and one hundred years after, in 1832, the venerable 
structure was demolished to make way for the new London 
Bridge now standing, Holbein, the painter, lived on the 
bridge, book publishers occupied shops on it, and the London 
tradesmen believed it to be one of the Seven Wonders of the 
world. Hogarth lodged here, and Swift and Pope visited 
Tucker, a bookseller who had a shop on the bridge. 

The most terrible reminiscence of the bridge is connected 
with the fact that its gate-houses at either end were garnished 
for many hundreds of years by the heads of many great and 
good men as Avell as of bad and depraved villains, whose skulls 
,werc exposed on spikes to dry and bleach in the sun. 



550 



TUE BKIDGES OF LONDON. 



The heads of Sir William Wallace, 1305; Simon Frisel, 
1306; four traitor knights, 1397; Lord Bardolf, 1308; Bo- 
lingbroke, 1440 ; Jack Cade and his rebels, 1451 ; the Cor- 
nish traitors of 1497, and of Fisher, Bishop of Rochester (dis- 
placed in fourteen days after by that of Sir Thomas More, 
1335), have adorned this ghostly bridge. From 1578 to 1605, 
it was a common sight to see the heads of Roman Catholic 
priests exposed on this bridge, their offence being that they 




TEMPLE BAR, FLEET STBEEET 



sought to preach their doctrines in London. Finally, in the 
reign of Charles II., this display of bare, grinning skulls was 
transferred to Temple Bar. 

Temple Bar, as it is called, is a large, gray archway, which 
spans Fleet street in its busiest traffic and jam. The archway 
was formerly the limit of the City of London, and when a sov- 
ereign came westward from Westminster, or eastward from 
the Tower, to make a formal entry, the Lord Mayor and the 



THE TKATFIC ON LOISTDON BEIDGES. 651 

City Councils, in robes of state, were present under its his- 
toric archway to offer the keys and admit the Sovereign. Tlie 
nisty gates were then rolled back, and on such occasions the 
pageants were very fine. 

> For over a hundred years the London traders and shop- 
keepers, and the students of the Temple, were regaled with 
the daily and ghastly sight of a row of grinning and sock- 
etless skulls, which were ranged in lines on cruel spikes above 
the architrave of Temple Bar. There is an empty room in the 
upper story which has a terrible history, for here heads were 
boiled in pitch before being exposed. 

In 1737, Eustace Budgell, a cousin of Addison and a contrib- 
utor to the Spectator, when reduced to poverty, took a boat at 
Somerset Stairs, and ordering the waterman to row down the 
river, threw himself into the flood as the boat shot London 
Bridge. He had filled his pockets with stones, and he left be- 
hind him a slip of paper on which was written, " What Cato 
did and Addison approved cannot be wa-ong." This was a 
great puff for Addison's tragedy. Edward Osborne, an ap- 
prentice of Sir William Ilewet, afterwards Lord Mayor, jumped 
from the window of one of the bridge houses, in 1536, to save 
his master's daughter, an infant, and years after^vards he was 
rewarded with her hand in marriage, and became Lord Mayor 
himself The grandson of the apprentice became Duke of 
Leeds and the founder of the present ducal house of that name. 
Ko bridge ever constructed had such a history as that of Old 
London Bridge. 

The flow of traffic on some of the principal bridges by actual 
computation during twelve hours, from 6 a. m. to 6 p. m., was : 
Pedestrians, London Bridge, 96,080 ; Southwark Bridge, 2,500 ; 
Blackfriars Bridge, 48,095 ; Waterloo Bridge, 12,000 ; West- 
minster Bridge, 38,015. Equestrian traffic : London Bridge, 
211 ; Southwark Bridge, 93 ; Blackfriars, 91 ; Waterloo, 38 ; 
Westminster Bridge, 311. Vehicular traffic : London Bridge,' 
36,800 ; Southwark Bridge, 516 ; Blackfriars Bridge, 6,384 ;' 
VYaterloo Bridge, 2,603 ; Westminster Bridge, 7,300. From 
:hese figures it will be seen that the traffic on London Bridire 
34 - ^ 



'552 THE BRIDGES OF LONDON. 

wliicli leads from the heart of the business portion of the city, 
and is toll free, exceeded that on all of the others put together. 
Some of the bridges are o\vTied by companies and a toll ot half 
a penny per passenger is taken for revenue by them. 

London Bridge was designed by Sir John Rennie and built 
by his son. The first pile was driven March 15th, 1824, gov- 
ernment contributing £200,000 toward the undertaking. 
Altogether the bridge cost £2,000,000 before it was fimshed. 
It is built on coffer-dams, and the bridge has five semi-elhpti- 
cal arches. The centre arch has a span of 152 feet, and a rise 
above high water mark of 24 feet 6 inches ; the two arches next 
the centre are 140 feet span, and the two abutment arches 
have 130 feet of span. There is a parapet four feet high and 
the length between the abutments is T82 feet, while the width 
between the parapets is 53 feet. The bridge was nearly eight 
years in construction, and 120,000 tons of stone were usedm 

its erection. 

Southwark Bridge is constructed of iron with three colossal 
arches, and was built by Eennie. The middle arch has a span 
of 240 feet and a rise of 24 feet. Its height above low-water 
mark to the roadway is 55 feet. The cost was £800,000 and 
the bridge was opened in 1819. Its length is TOO feet, and the 
roadway is 42 feet wide. 

The new Blackfriars Bridge is 1,000 feet long, 42 feet wide, 
and the cost will be £300,000. 

Waterloo Bridge is the finest in the world. Its dimensions 
are : Length between abutments 2,456 feet, water-way, 1,326 
feet. The carriage-way is 28 feet wide with a pathway on each 
side of seven feet. There are nine arches, each of which are 
120 feet in span with a rise of 35 feet. Waterloo Bridge has a 
level grade from one end to the other. Canova, the sculptor, 
said of this bridge, "It was alone worth a journey from 
Rome to London to see it." The cost was £1,000,000. 

As a set-oif to what Macaulay has prophesied in regard to 
London Bridge and the future New Zealander, Baron Charles 
Dupin, the great French publicist, speaks of Waterloo Bridge 
as follows : 



WATERLOO BRIDGE. 



553 



"If from the inealenlable effect of the revolutions which em- 
pires undergo, the nations of a future age should demand one 
day what was formerly the I^ew Sidon, and what has become 
of the Tyre of the West, which covered with her vessels every 
sea ? — most of the edifices devoured by a destructive climate 
will no longer exist to answer the curiosity of man by the voice 
of monuments ; But "Waterloo Bridge, built in the centre of the 
commercial world, will exist to tell the most remote genera- 




THE NEW BLACKFRIAR3 BRIDGE. 



lions — ' here was a rich, industrious, and powerful city.' The 
traveller, on beholding this superb monument, will suppose 
that some great prince wished, by many years of labor, to con- 
secrate forever the glory of his life by this imposing structure. 
But if tradition instruct the traveller that six years sufficed for 
the undertaking and finishing the work — if he learns that an 
association of a number of private individuals was rich enough 



55J: THE BRIDGES OF LOiNDON. 

to defray tlie expense of tliis colossal monument, worthy of 
Sesostris and the Csesars — he will admire still more the nation 
in M'liich similar undertakings could be the fruit of the efforts 
of a few obscure individuals, lost in the crowd of industrious 
citizens." 

Charing Cross is the next bridge on the Thames, being built 
of iron and used by a railway company. It was built by Bru- 
nei, and is a graceful structure, but does not pennit of pedes- 
trian traffic. 

Westminster Bridge is nearly level in its grade, and has seven 
arches. It is 1,220 feet long. The cost was £400,000. 

Lambeth Bridge is of iron with three arches, each of 280 
feet span, and the width is 5-i feet. Cost, £100,000. 

Vauxhall Bridge is of iron with nine arches of equal span — 
each 78 feet wide. The breadth of the roadway is 36 feet, and 
the total length of the bridge is 840 feet. 

Pimlico Railway Bridge is built of iron, with four openings 
or spans of 175 feet each. The bridge is 900 feet in length, 
and has a width of 24 feet. 

Chelsea Chain Suspension Bridge is 922 feet long and 45 
feet wide. Cost, £75,000. 

Hannuersmith Suspension Bridge is 841 feet long and 32 
feet wide. Cost, £180,000. 

Scott, the American diver, lost his life while performing 
acrobatic feats on Waterloo Bridge. The season he chose 
for diving from a height of twenty feet above the parapet of 
the highest London bridge was during an intense frost, when 
the river was full of ice, and the enormous masses floating with 
the tide scarcely appeared to leave a space for his reckless 
plunge into the river or his rise therefrom. He watched his 
moment, and the feat was performed over and over again with 
perfect safety. But he had been told that the Londoners 
wanted novelty. It was not enough that he should do day 
after day what no man had ever ventured to do before. 

To leap off the parapets of the South wark and Waterloo 
bridges into the half-frozen river had become a common thing ; 
and so the poor fellow must have a scaffold put up, and he 



DEADLY ACKOBATICS. 



555 



must suspend liimself from its cross bars by his arm, his leg 
and liis neck, in succession. Twice was the last experiment 
repeated ; but on the third attempt the body hung motionless. 
The applause and laughter that death could be so counterfeited 
was tumultuous ; but a cry of terror went forth that the man 
was dead. He perished for catering to a morbid pubUc appe- 
tite. Every one who saw this voluntary hanging went away 
degraded and disgusted at the terrible result of the show. 




CHAPTER XXXIX. 




AT WINDSOR CASTLE. 

ROM Windsor Castle the view is one of the 
finest in England. A vast panorama 
extending as far as the eye can reach. 
All flat — the faint, hare, blue horizontal 
line, scarcely discernible from the clouds, 
so distant is it, as straight as the bound- 
ary of a calm sea — and yet how infinitely 
varied ! What would such an expanse 
of land be in any other country but England, which is, in itself, 
a huge landscape garden ? 

A lovely river, to which the hackneyed illustration of " a 
stream of molten gold " might well be applied, from the silent 
roll of its glittering waters, as if impeded by their own rich 
"Weight, now flashing like a strip of the sun's self, through 
broad meadows, whose green is scarcely less dazzling — now 
lost in shady nooks of wondrous and refreshing coolness. 

Trees of various species and growth, singly, in clumps, and in 
rows, are everywhere. Little bright-looking villages, with their 
white spires, or grey towers, are dotted all over the scene. Be- 
yond where I stand, on the ramparts of the Castle, I can see 
tlie Gothic turrets and spires of Eton College, founded by 
Henry of Lancaster, flanked by oak and birch trees, and above 
us, on this delightful day in autumn, tlie banner of St. George 
is floating right saucily, denoting that this Martial Keep is a 
royal fortress and a hereditary residence of the Sovereigns of 
England. 



J 



THE DEMON HUNTSMAN. 557 

Everything seems in perfect harmony around us, as the sun 
falls in slanting and roseate beams on grass, tree, flower, cas- 
tle, and river. There are not many hours, in one's life, such 
as I enjoyed that pleasant evening in September. The gentle 
hum of human life reaching me from the distance, is no more 
injurious to the effect than the rustling of the trees, or the 
chirping of the birds. The quiet bustle down at the stone bridge, 
the shouts of the bargemen — heard several seconds after their 
utterance, — the plashing of the oars of stray boats, the crick- 
eters over there in their playground, where reposes some of 
the dust of Arthur's blood ; all these have a charm for the 
drowsy senses. 

The sleepy-looking chimneys of the old, royal town, imme- 
diately beneath me, fill up their place in the picture famously; 
even steam — ^that most implacable enemy of romance — ai)pears 
on the scene without injuring it. The little toy-liouse-looking 
railway station, which I can see from where I stand, on the bat- 
tlements, is a harmless, nay a pleasing object; and to watch 
the lilliputian train that has just left it, disappearing fussily 
among tlie old trees, is a perfect delight. 

Windsor Castle has been the abode of royalty from the time 
of the Saxon Kings. It was while King John lived at Wind- 
sor, that the barons obtained from him Magna Charta. Crom- 
well has held his republican courts in Windsor, and Charles I 
lies buried in its Chapel Royal. 

James, the Royal poet and King of Scotland, has visited 
here, and David, another Scottish monarch, was a prisoner in 
its gloomy towers. Here was instituted the Order of the Gar- 
ter by Edward, who was " every inch a King," and some of the 
most splendid pageantries and courtly ceremonies of history 
have been enacted within the walls of Windsor Castle. In its 
vast forests, Heme, the Diabolical Hunter, has chased the 
Phantom Deer to the tally-ho of unearthly horns. This forest, 
or, as it was called, "Windsor Great Forest," was of enormous 
extent, and comprehended a circumference of one hundred and 
twenty miles. In the time of James I, this great area had 
been reduced to seventy-seven and a half miles. There were 



558 AT WINDSOR CASTLE. 

then three thousand head of deer, and fifteen walks, in the forest, 
each about three miles long. The next reduction of its size 
left the Forest only fifty-six miles in circumference, and in 
1814 an act of Parliament was passed to enclose its bounda- 
ries. Since then villages, and detached buildings, and private 
residences, have encroached upon this once magnificent de- 
mesne, until but 6,000 acres of wood and dell have been left of 
all the great medieval acreage. 

Edward, the Confessor, held a court here, and assigned the 
Manor of "Windsor to the Abbot and Monks of Westminster. 
William de W^ykcham, the great philanthropist and scholar, 
who founded Winchester School and the New College at Ox- 
ford, was appointed Clerk of the Works at Windsor to super- 
intend the reconstruction of the Castle, in 1356, and his fee 
from Edward III for the service was one shilling a day while 
he remained in the town, and two shillings a day when he 
went elsewhere upon business. 

The Castle is divided into a great number of apartments, 
many of which are memorable for their historical recollections, 
and among them are St. George's Chapel, Beaufort Chapel, the 
Round Tower, the North Terrace, the Audience Chamber, the 
Vandyck Gallery, the Queen's Drawing Room, the State Ante- 
Room, the Grand Vestibule, the Waterloo Chamber, the Grand 
Ball Room, St. George's Hall, the Guard Chamber, the Queen's 
Presence Chamber, the King's Closet, the Queen's Private 
Closet, the King's Drawing Room, the Throne Room, the State 
Apartments, and the Private Apartments. The Home Park 
attached to the Castle is a private garden in which the Queen 
walks or rides while residing at Windsor. The Queen seldom 
rides on horseback of late years, as she has become so fat and 
pursy that she is in constant dread that she will have to take 
any such exercise as walking in the open air, or even promen- 
ading upon the Grand Terrace of Windsor. 

In St. George's Chapel, a beautiful little edifice, are hung 
the banners of the ,Knights of the Order of the Garter, and 
under each banner is the carved stall, made of wood, on which 
each Knight of the Chapter sits, at the installation of a new 



PRAYING FOR CHEESE AND BEER. 659 

member, or when any grand ceremony may make their pres- 
ence necessary. In the groined roof above the banners, are 
worked the arms of Edward the Black Prince, Henry VI, Ed- 
ward IV, Henry VII, and the succeeding English Sovereigns. 
The helmets, swords, and mantles of the Knights, together 
with the brass plates, recording their titles, are also to be seen 
here. In this Chapel is buried the crumbled dust of poor Jane 
Seymour, one of Henry VIII's unfortunate wives and the 
mother of Edward VI, who reformed the Prayer Book and 
Liturgy of the Church of England. The body of Charles I also 
lies here, but he was more fortunate than Jane Seymour, 
whose memory is almost forgotten. 

In the Beaufort Chapel is the family tomb of that perverse 
old idiot of a king, George III, in which repose the ashes of his 
children and Queen ; the Duke of Kent, father of Queen Vic- 
toria, Princess Charlotte, William IV, uncle to Queen Victoria, 
the royal blackguard and scoundrel George IV, the Princess 
Augusta, who was believed to have been insane, and Queen 
Adelaide. 

It is in the Beaufort Chapel that the Poor or Military Knights 
of St. George's College, assemble to pray and beseech the Al- 
mighty for the health and welfare of the Queen of England, 
and for the Most Noble Companions of the Order of the Garter, 
to whom the Poor Knights cling as a species of indigent para- 
sites. The Order of Poor Knights was established by act of 
Parliament of Edward IV, in the name of the "Poor Knights 
of St. George's College," and was to consist of a Dean, 12 
Secular Canons, 13 Priests, 4 Clerks, 6 Choristers, and 24 
"Alms Knights." 

At divine service in the Beaufort Chapel, these old, broken- 
down looking men may be seen, on every festival, and on all 
occasions when services are held, praying for the reigning Sov- 
ereign of England. For tliis service they receive bread, cheese, 
beer, and meat, ten times a week. I saw these worn, meek- 
looking men, who seemed to glide rather than walk during 
service, but it seemed to me that very little prayers were ut- 
tered by them for the Sovereign, as they all had a vacant, 



560 



AT WINDSOR CASTLE. 



absent look, wdth the exception of one or two who had the reg- 
ular fixed John Bull stare, and were evidently awaiting the 
hour when bread, cheese, and beer, were to be announced. 




WINDSOR CASTLE. 



In the Round Tower, which is 295 feet high, there were con- 
fined nearly all the State prisoners whom despotism found it 
necessary to secure in its dungeons, from Edward III to Charles 
II, and in the ''Audience Chamber," which is hung with Gobe- 
lin Tapestry, representing the story of Queen Esther, are paint- 
ings of Mary, Queen of Scots, and William, Prince of Orange. 
This is an "Audience Chamber" only in name, for the Queen 
very seldom holds levees in this big, desolate-looking room. 

The "Waterloo Chamber" is 47 feet in length and 45 in 
height, and has a gallery of magnificent portraits, by Lawrence, 
all of whom were, in some fashion, connected either in the 
closets of diplomacy, or the fields of strife, with the downfall 
of Napoleon; hence the name of "Waterloo Gallery." Here 



IN THE queen's CHAMBER. 561 

are life-size portraits of Wellington, Lord Castlercagh, Hum- 
boldt, Alexander I, Count Nesselrode, Capo d'Istria, Prince 
Scliwartzenburg, Archduke Charles, Bluchcr, Platoff, the Mar- 
quis of Anglesea, Francis II, of Austria, Pope Pius Yll, and 
others equally famous. 

In the Grand Chaml^er is a piece of ordnance, taken from 
Tippo Saib, at Seringapatam, a table made from the wreck of 
the Royal George, and an elaborately worked shield of silver, 
inlaid with gold, made by Benvenuto Cellini, which was pre- 
sented by Francis I, of France, to Henry YIII, of England, at 
the Field of the Cloth of Gold. 

The Throne Room has a fine ceiling, ornamented with the 
different emblems of the Order of the Garter. Here tlie Queen 
sits enthroned on occasions of State, and receives her guests 
habited in a scarlet velvet mantle, trimmed with miniver. On 
one occasion, wlien her Majesty took her seat here, her costume, 
including the jewels and Crown, was valued at £150,000, a 
vast sum to be thrown away on such heartless vanities, when 
it is recollected that myriads of people were dying of want and 
starvation in her Kingdom at the time. 

The Throne is a very fine piece of work, and is covered with 
heavy hangings of red velvet, and is ornamented with the rose, 
shamrock and thistle. 

By special permission I had the pleasure of beholding the 
Queen's bed-room, or Private Closet. This is a favor seldom 
shown to any but foreign noblemen, or Embassadors, but by 
diligent efforts I had succeeded in getting permission to look 
at this sacred place. 

On the day that I visited Windsor Castle, it luckily happened 
that very few visitors had called, and as I had a note from a 
most high personage, with permission to see the private apart- 
ments of Her Majesty, I was glad that there was not a crowd 
to witness the result of my mission. As a point of honor, I 
find it impossible to mention the name of the great personage 
who gave me permission to visit the Queen's Chamber, as I fear 
it might give him trouble, and perhaps deprive him of his 
lofty position. 



662 AT WINDSOR CASTLE. 

Even the attendant, to whom I showed the note, was afraid 
to allow me to enter the apartments, as tlic Queen had only 
left them early tliat same morning to take a drive, and was 
expected back during the evening. It was now two o'clock in 
the afternoon, and I began to fear that I would not see the 
private saloons of her Majesty. 

The attendant said, in answer to my request : 

*' I tell you. Sir, I'll lose my place and perkisites if I show 
the hapartments to you. I dare not do it." 

"But," said I, "there is an order from Lord , will 

not that be sufficient?" 

" Yes," said he, " his Lordship is a great friend of the Queen, 
but I'm afraid this order is a mistake, and only refers to the 
public apartments, which I have no hobjection, Sir, to your 
seeing." 

I began to think I would fail if I did not find a weak spot in 
the gorgeous flunkey. 

Suddenly a thought struck me. I asked myself " who has 
been the most popular and best loved American in England ?" 

Echo answered, " George Pcabody." 

And "why," the inward monitor asked. 

Echo answered again, "because he gave so much money 
away," for I was positive that the English (servants at least) 
did not care for any of his less showy viitues, in comparison 
with that of bestowing millions from his private purse ! Why, 
the Queen herself give him her portrait. Did she not ? 

The flunkey seemed to read my soul the while that I com- 
muned with myself. 

I felt that I must throw myself in the breacli. ' Suddenly I 
slipped a bright new sovereign into the man's hand. His fin- 
gers closed on the shining gold coin like tlie teeth of a ^ase and 
his eyes glistened. I knew then from his look tliat I would have 
to pistol the flunkey on the spot before I could get back my sov- 
ereign. We were going toward the private apartments of her 
Britannic Majesty, who is also Defender of tlie Faith. 

A long corridor lay before us, and the flunkey stopped and 
said to me : 



THE SECRETS OF ROYALTY. 563 

" I'll try it, Sir. You are indeed very generous, and I honor 
you for it, but I don't know whether we can pass the Yeoman 
of the Guard. They are always about here guarding Iler Ma. 
jesty's private apartments. This is the Queen's Closet," 

He pointed to a lofty doorway, and I saw a big, bloated 
Britisher, walking up and down with something on his shoulder 
that looked like a meat- axe fastened upon a clothes-pole. He 
had a red tunic, and wore a round flat hat, and his legs which 
were very noble and imposing, were clad in red hose. 

The flunkey, who was also in tights, went up to liira and 
spoke, and I assumed a business-like air. He was telling 
the red-faced Beef-Eater, as I afterwards ascertained, that I 
came to make some repairs in the closet, but the Beef-Eater did 
not seem willing to admit any one ; but by some moral suasion 
he obviated his scruples, and I was allowed to enter. I think 
he divided the sovereign with him. 

The flunkey beckoned to me, and I approached. The Beef- 
Eater — noble fellow — looked the other way, as I entered the 
imposing apartment. 

The flunkey stood in silent awe, as I looked around on the 
splendors of the lofty room. 

A magnificent bed stood in a corner of the apartment, hung 
with red velvet and yellow silk. The arms of Great Britain 
were emblazoned on the heavy red velvet, and the Lions and 
Unicorns, disported playfully all over the room in their usual 
attitudes. There were large oil paintings of George IV, King 
William IV, the Duke of Kent, father of Queen Victoria, the 
Prince of Wales as a Colonel of the British army, and the 
Princess Louise, a marriageable daughter of Queen Victoria. 

The bed was large and would have held three persons of the 
size of Queen Victoria. Elegant lounges were arranged around 
the lofty apartment, covered with damask satin. A faint and 
delicious odor filled the room, and I seemed to sink in the soft 
and luxuriant carpets. Mystery, silence, and enchantment pre- 
vailed, and I trembled to think that I stood in the presence of 
Royalty unbidden, and without the permission of the Queen. 

There was a sideboard of most intricate carving at one end 



564 AT WINDSOR CASTLE. 

of the room, with some green Venetian glasses on one of its 
shelves, but I saw no decanters. The room was filled with a 
glory and power, reflected in the possessor of three Kingdoms. 
From without, through the deeply embayed windows, also hung 
with satin of the color of a morning sky, I could hear the 
tramp of the sentinels on the battlements, and the hoarse cry 
of the warders, going their rounds, demanding the counter- 
sign of strangers. 

The charmed silence was broken by the voice of the flunkey 
in answer to my enquiry as to how the aromatic odors of the 
chamber were procured. 

" Her Majesty is worry fond of perfumes, Sir," said he. 
" The carpets has Cologne shook on them every morning, and 
if you will come here to the bed, you will also get the smell of 
Patshooly." 

1 walked to the bed and I found that there was an odor of 
cologne, otter of roses, and musk, proceeding from the coun- 
terpane, which was bordered with purple velvet and gold lace, 
and had the royal arms embroidered in the centre. The pil- 
low slips had trimmings of Valenciennes lace, half a yard 
wide, hanging from their open ends. The counterpane was 
of quilted blue and pink satin, and inside of the velvet canopy 
that covered the bed, was a lining of blue and white satin, 
from which hung down heavy folds of Mechlin lace. 

A little table of ivory, inlaid with gold and lapis lazuli, stood 
a few feet from the bed, supported by a tripod elegantly worked 
in solid silver. , 

The flunkey explained to me the use of this table. " Some- 
times Her Majesty takes her breakfast in bed," said he, "when 
she is indisposed. Her Majesty is worry fond of coffee, and 
often takes two cups of a morning when she is stopping at 
Windsor. She is fond of veal cutlets, well done, and sweet 
breads, for breakfast. Yes, Sir, I have heard that Her Majesty, 
God bless her, when she had a good appetite, before Prince 
Albert died, would eat a pound of veal at breakfast. The lady 
in waiting places her coffee on that small table, and after 
handuig Her Majesty her breakfast in bed, she stands off" at a 



WOT A PEOPLE THE HAMERICANS ARE.' 



665 



respectful distance, and waits until she is called again to offer 
Her Majesty a favorite dish. The Duchess of Athole, who is a 
relation of Lady Mordaunt, is greatly liked by Her Majesty, and 
when she waits on the Queen, Her Majesty allows her to sit 
down, but all the other ladies in waiting, excepting Lady Di- 
anna Beauclerk, has to stand up. Sometimes, when the Prince 
of "Wales comes here, God bless him, he is awfully screwed 
(drunk), and then the Queen makes a prcshis row, and she 
wont speak to him for a week after. 

" You are the only American ever was allowed to enter this 
ere room. Sir ; but I have heard that one of your countrymen 
once strayed in here, and was astonished to find that there was 
no ' spittoons,' I think he called them, in the Queen's bed-room. 
A preshis thing that would be, to have sich things as ' spittoons' 
in the Queen's bed-room," said the indignant and loyal flunkey. 
. I informed the man that the story was incredible, and that 
my countrymen were not such savages as he believed them to 
be. When I informed him that in the old times in America, 
any free and unwashed citizen might have inspected the Pres- 
ident's bed-room at the White House at Washington, he was 
greatly astonished, and said : 

" My God, what a strange people the Hamericans are ! And 
they allowed them to look at his bed, did they ? My heyes, 
wot a people !" 




m(^i^^%.^^' 



1 




CHAPTER XL. 

BEFORE THE MAGISTRATES. 

HEEE are two places well wortli seeing in 
London. One is the Central Criminal 
Court or " Old Bailey " as it is iisnally 
called, situated next door to IS'ewgate, 
and the "Lord Mayor's" Court, in the 
Mansion House. 

The Old Bailey is a famous criminal 
Court, and has had an eventful history. 
The magistrates who sit here, are the Lord Mayor, who opens 
the Court, the sherijffs of Middlesex and London, the Lord 
Chancellor, who is never present excepting in a State trial, the 
Judges, Aldermen, and Recorder, the Common Sergeant of 
London, the Judge of the Sheriff's Court, or City Commis- 
sions, and others whom the Crown may appoint to assist them. 
Of these dignitaries the Recorder and Common Sergeant of 
London are most generally to be found presiding, as the com- 
mon law judges only assist when knotty points are to be de- 
cided, or when conviction may affect the life of the prisoner. 

At the Old Bailey are tried crimes of every kind, from trea- 
son to petty larceny, and even offences committed upon the 
high seas. The jurisdiction comprises every part of the me- 
tropolis of London, together with the county of Middlesex ; 
the parishes of Richmond and Mortlake in Surrey, and the 
greater part of Essex county, adjoining Middlesex. 

The Old Bailey Court is a square hall with a gallery for 
visitors, below which is a large clock, that ticks in the prison- 



THE "old bailey" coukt. - 567 

er's ears, like a bell of doom. Below it is the dock for the cul- 
prits, with stairs descending to the covered passage, by which 
they are conveyed to and from ISTewgate. Opposite the dock 
in which the wretched prisoner stands up to plead for mercy, 
is the bench for the judges, and here may be seen day after 
day the Recorder of London sitting to try oiFenders, in his 
blue cloth gown, with furred borders, and his neck encircled 
with a gold chain, listening listlessly to the testimony, and now 
and then making notes on a square piece of paper, while from 
the open window comes the chirruping of birds ; and before him 
are arraigned poor wretches in rags and squalor, on trial for 
offences which may j)eril their lives, reputation and hap- 
piness. 

There are three large square windows in this Court, through 
which api:)ear tlie ridge of the gloomy walls of Xewgate, hav- 
ing on their left a gallery close to the ceiling, with projecting 
boxes, and on the right the Bench extending the whole length 
of tlie wall, with desks at intervals, for the use of the judges, 
whilst in the body of the Court are the witness-box and the 
jury-box, below the windows of the Court, an arrangement 
that allows the jury to look clearl}', and without turning, on 
the faces of the witnesses and the prisoners. The strong light 
from the windows enables the witness to identify the pris- 
oner, who stands shivering in the dock, at the same time that 
it permits the judges on the Bench and the counsel below in 
the hollow space of the Court to keep jury, witnesses and pris- 
oners all at once within the same perspective line. 

In the upper seats are the double rows of reporters, smart, 
well-looking and well-dressed fellows, the majority of whom 
look bored and disgusted, as well they may, when it is taken 
into account that they have to sit here day after day, to look 
at the same horse-hair wigs of the jabbering lawyers, the 
same gowns, the same blank ceiling, the same stupid, harsh 
faced jurymen, and the same hard looking or M'obcgone 
wretches who stand up in the dock to listen to sentence or ac- 
quittal. Occasionally there is a little amusement for tliem 
when some ass of an alderman attempts in a pompous way, to 
35 



568 ■ EKFOKE THE MAGISTKATI';S. 

show the bearing of a statute in a criminal ease, and only suc- 
ceeds in exjjosing his turtle-fed ignorance to the merriment of 
the knowing ones. 

Look there now. A youth well-dressed and cleanly-looking 
is brought into the dock and placed for trial on a charge of for- 
gery on his employer, for the sum of one hundred and fifty 
pounds. The young fellow has a weak, pallid face, and seems 
rather dazed at all the preparation and mysterious jabber on 
his account. A dozen of the counsel, in black stuff gowns and 
with white wigs of horse-hair look around for a minute at the 
dock, where the prisoner stands, merely out of curiosity, as if 
he were a sheep or a calf brought in for slaughter. Their cu- 
riosity satisfied, they turn away from him and dismiss his pale 
face from their thoughts almost instantaneously. The judge 
on the bench — who is flanked by a fat alderman on each side, 
in red robes — sits, looking at some documents, with a far-away, 
abstracted look, as if the prisoner at the bar was a thousand 
miles distant, and a free man. 

And meanwhile the case progresses, the counsel for the 
Crown opening indignantly on the side of virtue and the law, 
and witness after M'itness is called up and kisses the book, and 
there is much maldng of afiidavit and counter-afiidavit, and 
through all this maze of swearing and mist of statement, it ap- 
pears that the young lad at the bar has been w^ild and reckless, 
and has signed his master's name, beyond all doubt, to a check, 
which he had cashed, the proceeds of which were spent in 
the haunts of vice and shame. The case goes to the jury, who 
pi'onounce him guilty without leaving their seats, and the sun 
streams through the windows on the despairing face of the 
youth, and I am awakened from a sort of a trance into which 
I have fallen, to hear the voice of the Recorder of the good 
city of London, drone out at the prisoner : 

" In tins case I can find no extenuating circumstances. You 
are of age to know better, and the sentence of the Court is, 
therefore, that you suffer jjenal servitude, with hard labor, 
for the space of twelve years." 

Good God I twelve years ! He is not yet eighteen, and the 



THE judges' dinner. 569 

twelve best years of liis life are erased from his span of exist- 
ence, by the breath of the man in blue cloth gown and the fur 
tippet, and now the latter goes up stairs to eat his dinner, the jury 
are dismissed, and a young girl falls fainting in the Court as the 
prisoner is led out — however it is only his sister. There is a 
little stir among the horse-hair-wigged counsel and a buzz in 
the audience, and in three minutes another case comes on to 
excite new interest, and make us forget the convict and his 
sobbing, fiir-haired sister. 

Upon the front of the dock is placed a sprig of rue, which 
dissipates any infection that may proceed from the clothes 
of the prisoner, should he be suffering from illness. The 
origination of this custom is worthy of note. 
' In 1750, when the jail fever raged in Newgate, the effluvia 
entering the Court, caused the death of Baron Clarke, Sir 
Thomas Abney, the judge of the Common Pleas ; and Pen- 
nant's " respected kinsman," Sir Samuel Pennant, Lord May- 
or ; besides members of the bar and of the jury, and other per- 
sons. This disease was also fatal to several persons in 1772. 
Since that time a sprig of rue has always been kept in the 
dock to drive away contagion. 

Above the old Court is a stately dining-room, wherein, 
during the Old Bailey sittings, the dinners arc given by the 
sheriffs to the judges and aldermen, the Recorder, Common 
Sergeant, city pleaders, and a few visitors. Marrow-puddings 
and rump-steaks are always provided. Two dinners, exact 
duplicates, are served each day, at 3 and 5 o'clock ; and the 
judges relieve each other, but aldermen have eaten both din- 
ners ; and a chaplain, who invariably presided at the lower end 
of the table, thus ate two dinners a day for ten years. Theo- 
dore Hook admirably describes a Judges' Dinner in his Gll- 
hert Gurney. In 1807-8, the dinners for three sessions, nine- 
teen days, cost Sheriff Phillips £35 per day — £665 ; 145 doz- 
en of wine, consumed at the above dinners, £450 : total 
£1,115. The amount is now considerably greater, as the 
sessions are held monthly. 
, Outside in the lobbies and hall rooms, passages and corridors 



670 



BEFORE THE MAGISTRATES. 



adjacent to and connected with the Old Bailey Conrt there is 
always a crowd of lawyers, policemen, hangers-on, countrymen, 
cadgers, and persons anxious to hecome spectators, females of 
the poorer class, members of the aristocratic swell moh, sneak 
thieves and pickpockets, all curious to know how matters are 
going on inside with their friends or associates in crime or 
misfortune, and among them all, rushing hither and thither, 
chatting and joking, conferring with his clients, and nodding 




LOADING THE PRISON VAN. 



familiarly to the police and the officers of the Court, may be 
seen the sharpest legal bird in the world. I mean the regular 
Old Bailey practitioner, who could take a penny from a dead 
man's eyes, rob an altar, or cheat the widow and orphan, and 
still prove to his own satisfaction that it was done for a good 
and laudable purpose. 

A not uncommon sight in the vicinity of police offices and 
petty Courts, in London, is the noisy, brawling discharge of 



TIIK MAX5IOX HOUSE. 571 

prisoners, wlio are turned out on the streets in the niorning, 
after liaving been locked up all night for trifling offences, or 
disorderly conduct and intoxication. 

Their unlucky companions, M'ho have received sentences of 
imprisonment, are taken from the Courts to tlie places of con- 
finement in which they are to pay the penalty of their indis- 
cretion or crime. Every niorning there is a dreadful row and 
confusion at the Bow street police office, when the prisoners 
are brought out to be placed in the prison wagon or " van," 
in which they are transported to Ilolloway, Milbank or New- 
gate prisons. A large crowd assembles daily to witness the 
embarkation of these poor wretches for their new residences. 
Fighting Avomen, squalling children, patient policemen, and 
drunken blackmiards are among the details of these assem- 
blages. There is a strong able bodied virago, with her dress 
hanging to her form in shreds, who has just tossed her soiled 
bonnet madly among the crowd, with a series of shrieks, and 
three policemen aie hardly sufficient to restrain her, while she 
is being helped into the " Yan." At last she is locked up 
with other unruly personages inside of the iron door, in a dark 
box, where she may swear away to her heart's content for a 
ride of five to ten miles. 

And now let us take a look at the Justice Room of the 
Mansion House, which is only a few rods distant from the Old 
Bailey. 

Be it known to all my readers that the Mansion House, or 
Guildhall, is to London what the City Hall is to New York — 
the Hotel de Yille to Paris or Brussels — and the Stadt Hans 
to Amsterdam. It is here that the Lord Mayor of London lives 
and here he deals out justice to his constituents. The Guildhall 
or Mansion House of London is one of the finest public build- 
ings in the city, and has a noble gallery, dining hall, and a ser- 
vice of municipal gold and silver plate, which is used by the 
Lord Mayor on state occasions, besides a splendid collection 
of paintings. 

But it is of the Justice Court, a small room in the Man- 
sion House, that we liave to speak on this occasion, and not of 
the plate, or of the Lord Mayor's annual show. 



572 



BEFORE TUE MAGISTRATES. 



The Mansion House is just opposite the Bank of England 
and the Royal Excliange, in the very heart of moneyed Lon- 
don, Lombard street being but a very short distance around 
the corner, with its horde of money changers, bill discounters 
brokers, and bankers. 

This Court is not opened before noonday, as the Lord Mayor 
of London is too mighty a magnate to be hurried in his daily 
duties for any command or Court of Justice. 

Accordingly at noon, I find myself below the steps leading 

to the Mansion House, and 
presently I begin to ascend 
the broad staircase of stone, 
with a small crowd of po- 
licemen, officers of the 
Court, witnesses, and law- 
yers. I am questioned as to 
my business by an officer at 
the door, but being in com- 
pany with detective Ir^^ng, 
of New York City (who is 
about to appear before the 
Lord Mayor, in the case of 
("lenient ILirwood, the cele- 
brated forger, whom the for- 
mer had captured at Kew 
York on board of an Eng- 
lish steamer, before she had 
touched her dock, and had 
him brought back to Lon- 
don for trial), I am admitted, and after one or two turnings, 
find myself in a well-lighted room of moderate size, with a 
high ceiling and two windows looking out on the Poultiy and 
Threadneedle street. 

Between those two windows is a throne or dais, gorgeous 
enough for a monarch, and behind the throne are emblazoned 
the municipal mace and sword, and the motto of the City of 
London, " Doniine Dirige Nos," surmounted by the lion and 




DETECTIVE IRVING. 



THE KICH RASCAL. 573 

unicorn, the arms of Great Britain. This is the Lord Mayor's 
Chair of Justice, but the awful being to whom it appertains 
has not yet made his appearance, and I have leisure to look 
around me. 

There are two rows of desks, for the reporters, and behind 
them sit representatives of the Times, Daily Wews, Daily 
TelegrajpTi, Standard, Horning Advertiser, and other leading 
journals, the evening papers, with the exception of the Echo, 
Pall Mall Gazette and Globe not being represented, the others 
always copying their police reports from the morning journals. 

There are two or three high desks in the centre of the room, 
a square iron railing, and a number of police waiting to make 
charges, but the prisoners are kept below in the lockup and 
will presently appear through a trap door in the floor when 
they are called to answer to the charges on the sheet. 

The American detective has just finished his business re- 
garding Ilarwood's case, and saunters in carelessly with his 
hat in his hand to take a look around him. 

Presently there is a bustle and commotion, and a man look- 
ing like a drum major of a band, with scarlet and gold facings 
on his coat, whom I am informed enjoys the dignity of May- 
or's Marshal, marches into the room like a peacock, with his 
big staff of office, and cries out : 

"Make way there, for the Right Honorable the Lud 
Mayor." 

Then enters the awful being himself, in a furred robe of 
heavy cloth, like one of Hembrandt's burgomasters, a blazing 
gold chain depending from his neck and covering his waist- 
coat, and having taken his seat, the charge sheet is examined 
by him in a dignified way, and the first case is called. 

This is the case of the forger Ilarwood, a young man, the 
son of the senior partner of one of the largest banking firms 
in London, who has forged his father's name for the amount of 
£15,000. 

The trap door opens and discloses a fashionably-dressed and 
good-looking young fellow, with a police officer on each side. 
The case had excited great interest in London, and the prisoner 



5U 



Bf:FOKE THE MAG1STKATP:S. 



Imving fled to Xe-\v York was captured before the steamer got 
to her dock, and brought back to London, llarwood had 
been brought to justice because the junior member of the 
firm, to protect its interests, had been compelled to the unwill- 
ing task of making the charge against his partner's son. 

Ilarvvood has the air of a languid and haughty " swell," or 
exquisite, and is most fashionably dressed. There is no 
flinchino- in his blonde and whiskered face as he is 




BEFORE THE "LORD MATOR." 



brought up for sentence, having been previously contacted. 
Out of £15,000, detective Irving recovered over £11,000 from 
the forger, and it seems the charge is to bo hushed up. The 
father of the culprit is a wealthy citizen, and the counsel for 
the prisoner makes his point that the greater part of the 
money having been recovered, and the prisoner having '' suf- 
fered much anguish of mind " for his crime, has offered to go 



THE POOR KASCAL. 575 

to America if released, and make amends for his " fault " by 
leading a new and repentant life. 

I looked at the exquisite, who stood there as cool as a cucum- 
ber, and it seemed to me rather doubtful that he had suftered 
much anguish of mind, I also doubted if he would be willing 
to lead a very virtuous life in America. As he stood there 
with his assured and rather contemptuous look and insolent 
face, he was quite a contrast to the pale, weak-looking lad, who 
stood the day before in the dock of the Old Bailey to receive 
with trembling lips his sentence of twelve long years penal 
servitude, and just as the thought struck me, Irving, the de- 
tective, whispered to me : 

" He looks very sorry, don't he ? Of course ! Cheese 
things." 

Then the Lord Mayor plucked up a proper spirit, threw 
back his furred sleeves, put on a look of profound wisdom, con- 
sulted with the prisoner's counsel, and making up his judicial 
mind that Harwood had " suftered enough," — poor young 
man — the forger was released and set at liberty in order to al- 
low him to become a virtuous citizen of the United States. 
Nothing was said about the deficit of two or three thousand 
pounds ; the young man's family was wealthy and respectable. 
But who is this poor rascal at the bar novr, who appears as the 
friends of the wealthy forger gather in a knot to congratulate 
him. Why it is a low rnftian of a pickpocket who has been 
caught in the act of abstracting a lady's reticule valued at four- 
teen shillings. The villain ! lie has no wealthy friends, so 
let him take eighteen months imprisonment at Ilollaway pris- 
on, and there let him repent, while on the treadmill. 

I left the Lord Mayors Court with mixed feelings, and the 
remarks of the detective failed to reassure me as to the honesty 
of the method of administering justice by his Worship, the 
Lord Mayor of London. 




CHAPTER XLI. 

TWO EIVALS— CANTERBURY AND ROME. 

ETROPOLITAN Life has its religious 
phases, also. London contains about 410,- 
000 dwelling-houses, places of business, 
and public buildings, and in this vast ag- 
glomeration of brick, stone, and mortar — 
there are about seven hundred edifices de- 
voted to public worship. In this number 
are comprised places of worship for all sects : Roman Cathol- 
ics, Protestants of the Established Church of England, Baptists, 
Presbyterians, Independents, Jews, Greeks, Moravians^ Qua- 
kers, Socinians, "Wesleyan-Methodists, and even Hindoos, who 
have a temple of their own. 

There are two hundred and eighteen parishes in the Metrop- 
olis, under the jurisdiction of vestries and parochial bodies who, 
in turn, are subject to the Bishop of London, sitting as a 
temporal and spiritual peer in the House of Lords. He is Pro- 
vincial Dean of Canterbury, and Dean of the Chapels Royal at 
Whitehall and the Savoy. 

The Bishop of London ranks next to the Archbishop of York 
and Canterbury, and has an income of £10,000, annually, and 
the free gift of one hundred and nine livings, ranging in value 
from £2,000 to £30 a year. As Dean of Canterbury his income 
amounts to £2,000 a year. The clergymen of the Established 
Church receiving the largest salaries in the City of London, 
whose livings are in the gift of the Bishop of London, are 
tliose of St.'^Botolph, Bishopsgate, £2,290, St. Olave's, Hart 
street, Bloomsbury, £1,891, and St. Giles, Cripplcgate, £1,580. 



SPURGEON AND " APOCALYPSE" GUMMING. 577 

The smallest salary is that received by the pastor of St. Bar- 
tholomew the Less, who only gets .£30 a year, although his 
work is far harder than that of the Dean of Westminster, who 
receives X4,000 a year. The salary of the Archbishop of Can- 
terbury is <£ 20,000, and he has half a dozen palaces through- 
out the country. The Archbishop of York receives about 
X15,000 a year, and has two Episcopal and palatial residences. 
Spurgeon,thc great Baptist divine, who ranks somewhat like 
Henry "Ward Beccher, receives a salary of 818,000 a year for 
his preacliing, and his congregation, in 1860, erected for him 
a grand tabernacle at Newing-ton, on the Surrey side of the 
Thames near the Elephant and Castle, and in one of the rough- 
est districts of London, at a cost of X 25,000. The design 

is simple ; the dimen- 
sions 85 by 174 feet, 
and here, every Sun- 
day evening, nearly 
six thousand persons 
assemble to listen to 
the vehement elo- 
quence of Spurgeon, 
who has his congrega- 
tion drilled like a com- 
pany of infantry, and 
can move them to 
tears or laughter, as 
he chooses. 

Li Crown Court, 
Stran'\ is the Free 
Church of Scotland, a 

SPURGEON. 

weli-built and com- 
modious edifice, where the Scottish Presbyterians attend. The 
pastor of this church is known all over the world by his writ- 
ings and his prophetic denunciations of the coming destruction 
of the world, as "Apocalypse" Cumming. Thousands of pages 
have been written by this eminent divine, and hundreds of ser- 
mons have been preached by him, in which he has identified 




578 



TWO RIVALS CANTERBURY AND ROME. 



the Pope of Rome with the " Scarlet Woman" and the " Beast," 
having the mark on her forehead, yet at the call of the Ecu- 
menical Council, he was the first Protestant divine in England, 
who, in a manner acknowledged the Pope's jurisdiction Ijy writ- 
ing to him for admission to the Council as a Priest or " Pres- 
byter." Dr. Cumming is a very energetic preacher, and his 
services are always well attended by the disciples of his church, 
as well as by strangers, in London, who manifest a great de- 
sire to hear the illustrious Scotch divine. 

One of the most talked-about people in London is the famous 
"Father Ignatius," whose design is to bring over English Epis- 
copalians to the Roman Catholic Church, although he does not 
say so ostensibly. Tliis man is evidently sincere in his efforts 
to bring back the Englisli Church to the place of its depart- 
ure, for the Reformation — as far as the ceremonial goes. It is 

very little different, that 
old-fashioned church of 
St. Mary-le-Strand — 
where I saw Father Igna- 
tius officiating one Sun- 
day afternoon, in the 
midst of incense, ringing 
of silver bells, and kneel- 
ing worshippers, who 
went through all the 
most devout genuflec- 
tions of Roman Catholi- 
cism — from the Mother 
Church, in its ceremonial. 
Father Ignatius wore a 
vestment, with a huge 
cross down the back, his 
head was shaved on the top like that of a monk, and his face 
and eyes, as he descended the steps of tlie altar, which was 
surmounted with a Gothic cross, covered with flowers, and 
blazing with lights, had an ascetic aspect, which is not com- 
monly seen in the features or eyes of a clergyman of the State 




FATUER IGNATIUS. 



THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND. 579 

Cliurch. At every motion of the body he made a low rever- 
ence to the Crucifix over the altar. This Father Ignatius does 
not believe in a married Clergy, or in Lay or Congregational 
administration of a Churcli — in fact he does everything that a 
RomanCatholicPriestdoes,including the hearing of confessions, 
yet he dares not acknowledge the Supremacy of the Bishop of 
Rome, excepting in a negative sense. He is an advanced sol- 
dier of a large and growing party in the Church of England, 
who gravitate with tremendous strides daily towards the Church 
of Rome, but do not know that they are thus gravitating, or 
knowing, will not acknowledge the fact. This puny, slab-faced, 
and livid-looking Priest, has suffered, too, with steadiness, has 
been stoned and mobbed by angry crowds, yet lie perseveres 
in his work, and has many thousand followers, male and female, 
among the brightest, best, bravest, and most cultivated of 
England's aristocracy. 

It is a strange, old-fashioned, and conservative Church, this 
State Churcli of Great Britain. It has lasted three hundred 
years, with its feasts and fasts, its liturgy, its prelates, spiritual 
.peers, and Thirty-Nine Articles. 

Englishmen have always, until of late days, been conserva- 
tive, and this old-fashioned Church, with its grave ceremonial, 
its Canons, and Deaneries, with its Westminster Abbey, its St. 
Paul's Cathedral, and its Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, 
has, in every way, satisfied the English people — at any rate, it 
has served the purposes of the ruling classes. 

But the Church of England, like all other things in this 
world, has received some heavy blows in the course of its ex- 
istence. 

First came the Great Civil "War, in which Cliarles I lost his 
head, and with him the Church of England lost its revenues, 
and its great prestige departed when Laud ascended the scalfold. 

Then came the Restoration, which brought with it a disso- 
lute King, a dissolute nobility, and worst of all a dissolute 
clergy. The horse-riding, beer-drinking, and gambling parsons 
of the reigns of Queen Anne, William, and the Georges, such 
as Thackeray has so well described, in his Parson Sampson, 
were morally unfit to join issue, in a spiritual encounter,with such 



580 TWO RIVALS — CANTERBURY AND ROME. 

earnest, plucky, and aggressive Christians as "Wesley, Whit- 
field, and Bunyan, proved themselves, and consequently the Es- 
tablished Church lost its hold on half of the working men and 
the agricultural classes of England toward the first decade of 
the Nineteenth century. In particular, the manufacturing towns 
lost all respect for the faith of the King and court, and such 
places as Manchester, Sheffield, Liverpool, and Birmingham, 
became strongholds of Dissent, wliile the pews of the rural 
churches, where the poor of the parishes had never been wel- 
come, since the days of the dissolution of the monasteries, by 
Henry VIII, were left untenanted, and a brutal ignorance took 
the place of implicit faith among the English masses. 

And to cap the climax, a year ago a bill was brought into 
Parliament for the destruction of the Established Church of 
Ireland, a church wdiich never had been accepted by the Irish 
people, and though the English Churchmen, the Ministers, and 
the Tory party, rallied to save the doomed edifice, yet it was 
swept away in a night, despite the maneuvers of the leaders 
of the House of Lords, who wisely fought the bill as long as 
they could, believing it to be the first great blow delivered at 
the Established Church and the English aristocracy since 
Catholic Emancipation in 1829. 

At present there is a terrific struggle going on in the Estab- 
lished Church. One half of the clergy, among whom are the 
best educated and most scholarly divines, secretly lean to the 
Catholic Church, and belong to the " Ritualistic " party, with 
its incense, flowers, banners, and Protestant Sisters of Mercy 
and Nuns ; and the other half are again divided into those who 
doubt the inspiration of tlie Scriptures, and openly denounce 
the entire books of the Bible as a tissue of fables, with Colenso, 
and a third party, who having sprung from the people, and 
liaving no connection with any of the great beneficed Church 
families, and being incumbents of £100 livings, or less, cannot 
support their families or educate their children properly. This 
last faction is a growing one, and though less educated than 
the other two parties, they are equally earnest, and eagerly 
await the day when they can join the ranks of the Baptists, 



ROM AX CATHOLIC STATISTICS. 581 

Independents, Presbyterians, Wesleyans, or Methodists, for tlie 
purpose of forming a " Liberal " or " Broad " English Church, 
such as Dean Stanley is supposed to represent in his theories. 

In the mean time the Roman Catholic Clergy arc sleepless, 
indefatigable, and aggressive in their movements, and as they 
do not hope to convert the middle classes of the English peo- 
ple, who arc all staunch Protestants, they have laid siege to 
the souls of the two extreme bodies, the aristocracy and the 
very poor and destitute, as well as the working classes. And 
they are making great progress — in fact alarming progress, 
as I will show here. 

In 1380, when England and Wales had been Catholic coun- 
tries for more than seven hundred and fifty years, there were 
more than 14,000 parish churches, and 2,000 religious houses 
in the kingdom; there was one parish church to every four 
square miles throughout the kingdom, and one religious house 
to every thirty square miles ; and there were 40,000 priests, 
monks, and friars. The whole of these churches and convents 
were taken away or destroyed during the Reformation ; and, 
as I have said, when the church was at last again set free, she 
had to commence her work anew. In the half century since 
her hands were fully untied, she has built more than 1,000 
churches and chapels, and something like 300 monasteries and 
convents, and she has over 1,700 priests ministering at her 
altars. If this be the work of fifty years, how much less is 
it, proportionately, than the work accomplished by the same 
church in the first seven hundred and fifty years of her life. 

Therefore, the Roman Catholics, while they held supreme 
sway in England, built 14,000 churches, which is less than 
twenty in each year, while during the last fifty years they have 
built 1,000 churches, which is also twenty in each year ; but 
during this period, it must be remembered that the public sen- 
timent of Great Britain had been overwhelmingly Protestant, 
while in the previous period referred to, a Protestant was un- 
known. 

And now for the social status and influence of the Romanists 
in England. 



582 TWO RIVALS CANTERBURY AND ROME. 

There are, in the first place, 33 Catholic peers, 48 Catholic 
baronets, and 36 Catholic members of Parliament. There are 
lords and lords, and one lord differcth from another in glory 
as one star differcth from another. It is unquestionably true 
that the Roman Catholic peers and baronets are the represent- 
atives of the oldest, most noble, and most influential families in 
the kingdom. The reigns of Edward YI, Elizabeth, James I, 
and William and Mary, were marked by the extinction of the 
greater part of the Roman Catholic houses. The nobles, who 
clung to the ancient faith, were slain by the axe of the execu- 
tioner, driven into exile, or beggared by the confiscation of their 
estates, which passed into the hands of the comparatively 
mushroom aristocracy that sprang up upon the ruins of these 
illustrious families. But a few of the old nobility contrived to 
escape the fate of the majority. 

There are in the United Kingdom 27 dukes, 32 marquises, 
194 earls, 55 viscounts, and 220 ])arons — in all, 528 noblemen. 
But as I have ascertained by dint of patiently reading tln-ougli 
Burke's peerage, 228 of these are the holders of titles which 
are the " creations" of the present century ; 163 date back only 
to the eighteenth century ; 89 to the seventeenth century ; 17 
to the sixteenth century : 20 to the fifteenth century ; 3 to the 
fourteenth century ; 4 to the thirteenth century ; and 1 to the 
twelfth century. This last is Baron Kingsole, "whose title 
dates from 1181, and who is the twenty-ninth of his name. 

The most ancient dukedom is that of the Duke of Norfolk, 
created in 1483. The Norfolks, throughout all their history, 
remained faithful to the Roman Catholic church. The present 
Duke is the fifteenth of the name, and is " Earl Marshal, Pre- 
mier Duke, and Earl of England." Of the three nobles whose 
creation dates back to the fourteenth century, two are Roman 
Catholics ; of the twenty who date from the fifteenth century, 
six are of that religion ; and of the seventeen who date from 
the sixteenth century, three are of the old faith. Out of the 
four hundred and eighty whose titles are less than 270 years 
old, only twenty-two are Catholics. And of the forty-eight 
Roman Catholic baronets, about half of the number are the 



A SKETCH OF " LOTHAIR." 



583 



descendants of gentlemen to whom this hereditary rank was 
given in the early part of the seventeenth century. 

The ancient Roman Catholic hierarchy in England ended in 
1584, with the death of Thomas Watson, Bishop of Lincoln, who 
died in prison in that year. The hierarchy was not restored 
until Sept. 9, 1850, when the present Pope erected it by estab- 
lishing all England as the " Province of Westminster," cm- 
bracing thirteen dioceses, and presided over by an Archbishop. 
During this interval of 266 years, the Roman Catholic Clergy 
in England were at first under the direction of an Archpriest. 

In Scotland the hierarchy has not yet been restored. It 
ended with the death of the last Archbishop of Glasgow, who 
died in exile at Paris in 1603. Since then the Catholic Church 
in Scotland has been under the charge of Yicars-apostolic. 

The greatest conquest made 
by the Roman Catholic clergy, 
of late years, is that of the young 
Marquis of Bute, the original of 
Mr, Disraeli's " Lothair," in his 
social and politico - religious 
novel of that name. This 
young and noble lord was born 
on the 12th of September, 1847, 
and is now in his twenty-third 
year. His father, the second 
Marquis of Bute, married Lady 
Maria North, eldest daughter 
and co-heir of George Augus- 
tus, third Earl of Guilford. 
This estimable lady died childless, in 1841, and the old Mar- 
quis married again in 1845, Lady Sophia-Frederica-Christina 
Hastings, second daughter of the first Marquis of Hastings. 
The young Marquis Avas unfortunate in losing his mother when 
he was in his twelfth year. Lord Bute has been a great 
traveler for a man of his age, and being an only child he has 
had the best of tutors that Europe could afford. 

Nearly every young lady of wealth and rank in England 
36 




'lothair," (marquis of BUTE.) 



584 two RIVALS CANTERBURY AND ROME. 

set her cap for the young Marquis when he attained his major- 
ity ; but this nobleman is very unlike the Marquis of Water- 
ford or the Duke of Hamilton, who by tlw way are distant 
relatives of his. He is not fond of dissipation, and since his 
boyish days he has been of a reflective turn of mind, with deep 
religious yearnings — yet withal he is not guilty of cant, and 
docs not bore one with his religious views. He is good look- 
ing, but is not showy in his dress, and just now he is the lion 
of fashionable Europe from the fame which attends him every- 
where as the hero of Disraeli's novel. The Marquis was reared 
a Presbyterian with decided Church of England leanings, and 
was converted one year ago, to the Roman Catholic faith 
through the efforts of Monsigneur Capel, who has also a niche 
in " Lothair," under the title of Monsigneur Catesby. He is a 
most accomplished ecclesiastic, who unites with a fascinating 
exterior the greatest ability and perseverance. 

The income of the Marquis is about .£380,000 annually, and 
he has decided to give one year's income, which is nearly two 
millions of dollars, toward the construction of a Catholic Cathe- 
dral at Oxford, in which all the glories of the Medieval Gothic 
shall be renewed. The roll of this young nobleman's titles is 
enough to startle an American. They are as follows: John 
Patrick Crichton-Stuart, Marquis of Bute, Earl of Windsor, Vis- 
count Mountjoy in the Ise of Wight, Baron Mount-Stuart of 
Wortley and Baron of Cardiff Castle, Wales, in the Peerage of 
Great Britain. He is also Earl of Dumfries and Bute, Viscount 
of Ayr and Kingarth, Baron Crichton, Lord Crichton of San- 
quhar, Lord Mount-Stuart of Curabrae and Inchmarnock, and 
Hereditary Keeper of Rothesay Castle (formerly a Royal resi- 
dence) . Besides, he is a Baronet of Nova Scotia among the 
Blue-Noses. 

Through his mother he is a Crichton, which is a royal 
House, and by his father he comes of the equally royal House 
of Stuart, and he holds the title of " Lord of the Isles." The 
motto of his family is " Avito viret honore.^^ (He flourishes in 
an honorable ancestry.) The motto of the Hastings family, 
with which Lord Bute is connected, is " Trust warrants troth." 



BUTE, MANNING, AND NEWMAN. 585 

The most beautiful woman of the English nobility is Lady 
Yictoria-Maria Louisa Hastings, who is now in her thirty- 
third year. This lady was a great pet of Queen Victoria, and 
when a child Her Royal Higlincss, the Duchess of Kent, the 
mother of the Queen, held the pretty baby in her arms as 
sponsor at the baptismal font, for the sake of a dear friend. 
Lady Victoria's mother, who was Stephanie, Duchess of Ba- 
den, and a relation of the Emperor Napoleon. The young girl 
grew up, and is now the Avife of John Forbes-Stratford Kirwan, 
Esq., of Moyne, County Galway, L-eland. 

The Marquis of Bute is a relation of the late Baron Stuart 
de Rothesay, for many years English Ambassador at Paris. 

It has been variously hinted and rumored that the Marquis 
of Bute was at one time engaged to the Lady Albertina Ham- 
ilton, a daughter of the Duke of Abercorn, and also to a 
young lady of the Sutherland-Leveson-Gower family, which 
has for its head the Duke of Sutherland. It is said that the 
" Lady Corisande " of " Lothair," is none other than a daugh- 
ter of the Duchess of Sutherland, the former firm friend of 
Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe. 

If the Marquis of Bute was indeed a suitor for the hand of 
a daughter of the Duke of Abercorn, I am quite sure that he 
might have succeeded in his endeavor, for I believe that that 
worthy nobleman has been blessed with ten daughters and 
four stalwart sons, who can all answer to the Slogan of the 
Hamiltons. 

The young Marquis has residences and castles, and immense 
domains, at Mt, Stuart; Isle of Bute, at Cardiff Castle, Glamor- 
ganshire, at Dumfries House, and he has a town house in 
London ; besides, his name is inscribed on the registers of 
four London and three Parisian Clubs. 

The ablest man in the English Roman Catholic Church is 
Archbishop Manning, who has been such a firm supporter of 
the Papal Infallibility in the Ecumenical Council. In due 
time, no doubt, this prelate will liave the Cardinal's red hat 
conferred upon him for his services. 

The greatest scholar in the Roman Catholic Church, in Eng- 



586 TWO RIVALS CANTERBURY AND ROME. 

land, is Dr. J. H. Newman, the celebrated Oxford Tractarian, 
or Puseyite, who became a convert to Catholicism, with Man- 
ning, and since 1840 has devoted his brains to the service of 
his new ]\Iother Churcli with great learning and zeal. His 
picture shows one of the most spiritual faces in England — it 
is almost wierd in 'ts nature. 

There is a monument erected to a man named Dow, in St. 
Botolph's Church (Church of England) Aldgate, who be- 
queathed a sum of money to the clerk of the church, to pay him 
for ringing a bell at midnight, on tlie occasion of the execution 
of a criminal at Newgate. This was to call the attention of 
the condemned man to his soul. 

It was this same Robert Dow who left, by will, in the year 
1612, the sum of <£1 6s. Sd., annually, as a fee to the Sexton 
of St. Sepulchres, wliich is just opposite Newgate Prison, for 
pronouncing two solemn exhortations to condemned criminals 
on the night preceding and on the morning of their execution, 
as they passed the church-door on their way to Tyburn-Tree. 




^ 



CHAPTER XLII. 



THE LEGION OF THE LOST. 




,ERY different estimates have been made as to 
the extent of the Social Evil in London, but 
that made some fifteen months ago by the 
Right Reverend Dr, Wilberforce, Bishop of 
Oxford, from facts and figures furnished him 
by medical men, the police returns, and the minor cler- 
gy, places the number of abandoned or public women 
in London, at the startling aggregate of eighty thou- 
sand unfortunates. 

This estimate of Vice and Sin is certainly calculated 
to intimidate and terrify the Christian people of England, were 
it not for the fact that a hundred agencies are constantly at 
work, upheld and supported by good men and women, to lessen 
the number of these fair and frail members of the Legion of 
the Lost. 

The great parade ground of the abandoned women of Lon- 
don, is the Haymarket, when all London is at rest — when 
bed-room blinds are drawn down, and street doors locked and 
chained — when lights are rarely seen but in the windoAvs of tlie 
sick wards of hospitals — then the Haymarket is in its glory, 
gay and lively as a ball-room, and swarming with gaudily 
dressed women sauntering and flaunting up and down its broad 
pavements, crowding them as on an illumination night. The 
dissolute and idle, the debauchee and the debauched, pour into 
this market of sin, this Exchange of Vice and Harlotry, like 
moths attracted by the glare that must sooner or later utterly: 



588 



THE LEGION OF THE LOST. 



destroy tlicm. This street is always at night full of cabs, 
drunken men, noisy women, jugglers, and thieves. 

The Haymarket is the Republic of Vice, where all who enter, 
are liale fellows well met, for every one knows why the other 
has come here, and caution being cast off for the time, all ranks 
and stations mingle. 

Outside the tavern doors are gathered clusters of swells talk- 
ing to the poor souls, who, disguised by some flash dressmaker, 
have hidden the figure of the servant-maid under the toilette of 
the mistress. The heir to a title stands bowing to some pretty 
faced girl, who mixes her bad grammar with oaths. The door 
of a pul)lic house swings back to let the hope of a family 
enter, who is about to sip wine at the counter with the chip 
bonnet at his side. 




I 



" Scott's" in tub haymakket. 



Let US enter " Scott's " in the Haymarket. " Scott's " is the 
great Oyster House of London. It is a little cosy, crowded 
place, and not more than fifty feet deep by half as many feet 



" Scott's" in the haymarket. 589 

in width. At any hour of the night and until two o'clock in 
the morning, it is possible to get oysters, fried, roasted or 
raw, at " Scott's." They are also cooked with cracker dust, 
which makes them taste as if they had been broiled in sawdust. 
Oysters are quite dear at " Scott's," and will cost throe shil- 
lings a dozen, raw, which is a very high rate when compared 
with the price of our American oysters. They are small and 
bitter, and black, and the best of the bivalves come from Ostcnd 
in Belgium. 

There is a counter at the front of the shop, and behind this 
counter are exposed all kinds of shell-fish, lobsters, prawns, 
crabs, periwinkles or " winkles," and oysters, as well as mus- 
cles. The bounding clam is unknown in England, however, 
and is not found amongst the edibles. Behind this counter 
the proprietor and his wife, and three or four male assistants 
in white aprons, are busily engaged opening oysters and serving 
up lobsters and dressed lettuce, to the customers who prefer 
to eat standing. To eat standing, however, is not the com- 
mon custom in England, and the majority who wish to eat oys- 
ters take seats in the little stalls behind in the back room, 
which are exactly like our American oyster stalls, only that they 
are furnished with plush cushions. In these stalls are clerks, 
swells, men about town. Englishmen and foreigners, eating 
oysters and drinking Stout, or supping on lobsters and cham- 
pagne, and as it is now after eleven o'clock, nearly every man 
in these stalls has a girl of a certain class with him, who is 
of course eating supper at his expense. 

Ui>stairs there is a room somewhat similar to the one below, 
which is now densely crowded ; but the upper room is more 
select. I went u|>stairs, and here I found a number of couples 
lounging in a free and easy manner, and some were calling 
loudly upon the waiters for brandy and water. Seated in one 
of these stalls is a pink-faced boy, fresh from his country 
home, helping with delicate attention the painted woman be- 
side him to costly viands. 

She laughs noisily as a man, flinging her arms about, and as 
the Champagne foams in her glass, she tosses her head like 



590 ■ THE LEGION OF THE LOST. 

a Bacchante. But an action that by daylight would seem dis- 
gusting to the boy, is charming in the blaze of the Ilaymarket 
gaslight, and the lad looks with admiration upon the compan- 
ion whom on the morrow he would pass without a nod of re- 
cognition. 

The police returns for the year 1868-9, give the following 
figures as to the mimbcr of public women, or prostitutes, who 
are known to the police in the metropolitan district of London : 

Brothels. Prostitutes. 

Within the districts of Westminster, Brompton, and 

Pimlico, there are, 

St. James, Regent-street, Soho, Leicester-square, 
Marylebonc, Paddington, St. Jolin's-wood, . 
Oxford-street, Portland-place, Kew-road, Gray's-inn- 

lane, . . . 

Covent-garden, Drury-lane, St. Giles's, 
Clerkcnwell, Pentonwell, City-road, Shorcditch, 
Spitalfields, Hounsditch, Whitechapel, llatclitf, 
Bethnal green, Mile-end, Shad well to Blackwall, 
Lambeth, Blackfriars, Waterloo-road, 
Southwark, Bermondsey, Rotherhithe, 
Islington, Hackney^ Homerton, .... 
Camberwell, Walworth, Peckham, , . . 
Deptfbrd and Greenwich, ..... 

Kilburn, Portland, Kentish, and Camden Towns, 
Kensington, Hammersmith, Fulhani, 
Waltham-green, Chelsea, Cremorne, .. .. ^ 

2,825 8,600 

For the one public woman here registered' there are five who 
do not reside in brothels, but live alone, hiring lodgings for 
which they pay from eight shillings to five guineas a week, ac- 
cording to the manner in which the apartments are furnished, 
and the character of the neighborhood in which they are situ- 
ated, so that it is calculated that there are seventy to eighty 
thousand women in London whose names do not appear in the 
official list of the Lost, yet lead immoral lives, and whose 
sin is as great in the sight of God, but less in the sight of man, 
as their infamy is not of that nature that the law can punish 
them for it. 



153 


524 


152 


318 


139 


52a 


194 


546 


• 45 


480 


152 


349 


471 


1,803 


419 


965 


377 


802 


178 


667 


185 


4',5 


G5 


228 


148 


401 


88 


231 


12 


106 


47 


209 



I 



•' " MIDNIGHT MISSION." 593 

God knows it is from no persistent desire to uncover the sores 
and ulcers of the huge city, that I state these facts. 

Great and unceasing efforts are being made by the clergy 
and philanthropic citizens of London to diminish this terrible 
Traffic in Souls, which is the distinguishing mark of infamy 
that clings to the Haymarket. 

For some years past these unfortunate women have been col- 
lected together while plying their avocation, in an apartment 
in the vicinity of the Haymarket, in which some slight refresh- 
ments are prepared for them, ices and cooling but temperate 
drinks being served up gratis to all who will attend and listen 
to the words of repentance and hope from the mouths of cler- 
gymen who visit this place nightly for the purpose of reclaim- 
ing these Lost Ones. This is called the " Midnight Mission," 
or " Meeting," and the girls are gathered by having circulars 
presented to them in the street as the hour nears midnight. 
A great number attend, and they generally listen with patience 
and decorum. This Mission Avas founded by the Hon. and 
Rev. Ba})tist Noel, who first preached to the unfortunate girls. 

A high officer of the London police informed me that there 
were in that city about seven thousand lost women who are 
always well dressed, well gloved, and well shod, who live com- 
fortably, and many of them elegantly. These women, of course, 
are all Free Lances, and prey upon the fashionable young men 
of London and strangers who visit the great Babylon. 

Of this number, he stated that three thousand five hundred 
were what is called under protection, or kept mistresses. The 
remainder have hired lodgings for themselves in Pimlico, Fitz- 
roy square, Portman street, Howard street, Winchester street, 
Sutherland street, Gloucester street, and other respectable 
localities of the metropolis, paying two or three sovereigns a 
week for a suite of apartments, and furnishing them at tbeir 
own expense. This latter class, as a general thing, live indi- 
vidually apart from each other, and keep each a servant of all 
work, to do their cooking and washing. 

Some of tliese girls have furnished their apartments at a cost 
of from two to five Imndred pounds, ordering the most costly 



594 THE LEGION OF THE LOST. 

articles of fun-iture with the extravagance and profusion pecu- 
liar to their clacs. Pictures, ctageres, buffets, mirrors, ormolu 
clocks, tapestry carpets, and the most luxurious articles of 
bijouterie and the toilet are to be found in their apartments ; 
and, unlike their frail sisters in New York and Paris, these 
London girls act with complete ir.djpendence of their landla- 
dies, who in the citioo mentioned, as a rule, treat the unfortu- 
nate women placed in their power more like dogs than human 
beingn. In London, these girls are in the strictest sense their 
O'.vn mistresses, and therefore do not come under any police 
regulations ; nor can they receive the designation of profes- 
cionals, as they never solicit men on the street, or live in 
what is called a house of ill-fame. The persons who rent 
apartments to these girls in the districts which I have thus 
enumerated, are not supposed to know anything about the oc- 
cupation or business of tenants, and they never, by any possi- 
bility, attempt to interfere with them. 

One of the most frequented resorts of Lost Women in London 
is the Cremorne Gardens at Chelsea, on tlie Thames river 
bank, and distant about four miles from the Post Ofhce and 
St. Paul's Cathedral. 

These Gardens comprise about four acres, which are covered 
with trees, and ornamented with fountains, flower-beds, and 
statues. This is the maddest place in London, after ten o'clock 
in the evening. Until that hour, the middle class of London 
citizens, shoi>keepcrs, tradesmen, and clerks, and their wives 
and sweethearts, have possession of the Gardens ; but at that 
hour they leave the place, and from thence until one and two 
o'clock in the morning Cremorne is in the possession of Lost 
"Women and their male friends and abettors. 

Tlie Cremorne is in many respects very like the Mabille at 
Paris, but decency is better enforced, and the women at Cre- 
morne have not such a debased look as their unfortunate sisters 
of the Mabille. 

At Cremorne there is a circular platform on which a band of 
music is constantly stationed during the evening, and here 
the dancing is principally done. Betweou the dances the girls 



" SKITTLES " AND THE PRINCESS MARY. 



595 









promenade, or take supper with their male friends in the nu- 
merous restaurants, which are always crowded to excess by 
noisy people of both sexes, drinking Champagne and Moselle, 
or eating lobster or devilled kidneys. Cold suppers arc pro- 
vided for the girls in an upper saloon, for which tlicy are 
charged two shillings and sixpence a piece, without Avine. 
Then there are fireworks, two or three theatres and music halls, 
Japanese jugglers, bowling alleys, shooting galleries, and other 
modes of diversion and amusement. 

Swarms of young fashionables from the Opera, where tliey 
have been listening to the enchanting strains of a Tietjens, a 
Nillson, or a Patti, in evening dress with thin overcoats, may 
be seen here of a warm night, or perliaps they may liave come 
from the clubs in St. James or Picadilly, to kill time. 
" Skittles," 
now dead, 
who was at 
one time the 
most famous 
woman of 
her class in 
London, was 
very fond of 
attending 
Cremorne, 
where she 
was in the 
habit of 
drinking 
large quan- 
tities of Champagne. " Skittles " was at one time a great 
personage in London, and bore on her brougliam tlie crest of a 
Marquis. This audacious woman had tlie temerity to dispute 
the way with the Princess Mary of Cambridge, while that 
member of the Royal family was riding in Rotten Row. " Skit- 
tles" was on horse-back, being in full riding dress, and the 
Princess Mary was also on horse-back, when they met, and it 




' SKITTLES AND THE PRINCESS MART 



596 



THE LEGION OP THE LOST. 



is said tliat " Skittles " lifted her dainty little riding whip 
at the astonished Princess, and demanded that she should give 
her precedence in the Ride. 

Cremorne is a great place for rows between the women and 
the fast young men who attend the amusements there. Wliile 
promenading around tlie Dancing Ring one evening, I noticed 
a crowd gathering, and heard a female voice uttering screams 
of distress. The young lady with the unearthly voice I ascer- 
tained was a habitue of the place, known as " Mad Rose," 
and the offending biped was a certain fast baronet named Sir 
Frederick Johnstone, who has since figured in the Mordaunt 
Divorce Suit. 

It seems 
that this 
"Mad Rose" 
had been at 
one time un- 
der the bar- 
onet's pro- 
tection, and 
the a f t e r- 
noon before 
the rencon- 
tre he had 
met her in 
the Park, 
and passed 
her without 

recognition, although she sought it from him. She was deter- 
mined to have her revenge for this, besides some old scores she 
liad to settle with him ; or it was that he had not settled some 
old scores with her. 

The girl was tall, elegantly shaped, and dressed in a tasteful 
and rich manner, becoming her blonde hair and complexion. 
Seeing the baronet with his friends, slie stepped up to him, and 
singling him out, struck him across the face with her gloved 
hand, which was glittering with diamonds. 




A ROW AT CREMORNE. 



A ROW AT CREMORNE. 597 

Then she uttered a scream of feminine distress, and a crowd 
of swells gathered around her. Then she knocked olT liis hat 
and screamed again. The baronet uttered no remonstrance, l)ut 
hacked up against a railing, his hat lying on the ground. At- 
tempting to pick it up, she knocked it off again and screamed. 
This thing went on for the space of ten minutes, the girl, in a 
passion — whether fictitious or not, I cannot tell — slapi)ing the 
exquisite in the face at intervals, knocking off his hat and 
screaming, but not forgetting to pour volleys of abuse ui)on the 
baronet's head in the meanwhile. A great crowd collected 
and enjoyed the fun. But I noticed that not a man in the as- 
semblage offered to interfere, and the baronet's friends refused 
to molest her, with the exception of one, who caught hold of 
her wrists, and he had to let go his hold of her in an instant, as 
he was attacked in a body by the other girls, who put liim 
to flight immediately. The baronet begged for mercy, but 
got none; and, finally, a grand charge was made on the crowd 
by the Cremorne police, and it was dispersed. 

This movement relieved the baronet from further pereecu- 
tion, and the mad woman was taken away. One fact was no- 
ticeable — not a man in the crowd even attempted to raise liis 
hand to the girl during her repeated assaults. Had it been in 
America, I am certain she would, under such circumstances, 
have met with very rough,' if not brutal treatment. 




^ifc^ 




CHAPTER XLIII. 

SCARLET WOMEN. 

E were standing on the smooth, grassy lawn, 
at Goodwood, a wandering American and 
the writer, strangers in a strange land, with 
the bustle and uproar which are always ad- 
juncts to a Race Course in any country, 
and the Babel exclamations of a multitudin- 
ous assemblage sounding in our ears. 

It was the first day of the annual races, which are run 
for three days in every year, at Goodwood, the princely resi- 
dence and grounds of the Duke of Richmond. This is the 
most aristocratic race meeting held in England, and it is always 
frequented by the nobles and people of high social position, 
with their wives, daughters, and lady friends. 

The meeting is divided into three separate days running, 
each day having a distinctive title, and known to those familiar 
with equine sport, as the " Stakes Day," the " Cup Day," and 
the " Duke's Plate Day." 

It was a beautiful and unclouded English July noon, and the 
smell of the hawthorn hedges, and the faint breath of the hol- 
lyhocks made a perfume in the air, which banished all humors 
and sulkiness from the crowds of well dressed and well bred 
people who had been waiting to hear the saddling bell rung 
before the start. Lithe and sinewy little jockeys, clad in parti- 
colored silk shirts, and wearing kaleidoscopic caps of the same 
material, walked the fresh-looking, silken-maned, and symmet- 
rical-limbed horses, up and down the velvety green sward, to 
give the high bred English girls an opportunity to inspect their 



GOODWOOD RACES. 599 

favorites, whose colors predominated in tlie shades of their 
gloves, parasols, and gracefully-hung robes, which rustled 
around their supple and elegant figures. 

Under high, sheltering greenwood trees, cosy seats were ar- 
ranged for the ladies, who made the Lawn picturesque with their 
bright colored dresses that shone with splendor as their own- 
ers gathered in brilliant patches on the velvety turf, gossiping 
and chatting while Guardsmen, and Clubmen, Heavy Swells, 
and noisy boys, from Eton and Harrow, gamboled and shouted 
as if at cricket, and sedate gownsmen from Cambridge, and 
Double Firsts, and "Wranglers, from Oxford, made wagers, and 
drew from tlieir coat-pockets small betting books to record the 
sums invested. 

The Embankment, a high, long, and well-kept mound of 
grass-covered earth, was swarming with the fair sex, all of 
whom had their swan-like necks encircled with white lace ruff's, 
which serve so well as a setting for a well-shaped and milk- 
white throat. 

Afar off we could observe, through yawning gaps in the an- 
cient and stately trees, which were pierced by the ruddy beams 
of sunlight, the tall towers and fair proportions of Goodwood 
House, the magnificent mansion of the Duke of Richmond. 
Twenty to twenty-five thousand people were gathered in the 
noble old Park whose vistas stretched off into dells, copses, 
and woodland nooks, for thousands of acres. 

Here were gathered all the well-known aristocratic patrons 
of the turf in England, men who would hardly be seen at New- 
market or Epsom, and here again were the racing men, whose 
names are met with everywhere in England, where the warning 
bell is rung to saddle, and where thousands may be lost and 
won in an hour — the Westmorelands, the Savilles, Chaplins, 
Anneslics, Prince Soltykoff, Count de Lagrange, wlio owned 
" Gladiateur," Lord Vivian, Sir Frederick Jolmstone, Lord 
Roseberry, Sir Joseph Hawley, Admiral Rous, Captain Hall, 
Lord Wilton, Lord St. Vincent, Lord Ailesbury, SirC. Legard, 
Baron Rothschild, the Duke of Beaufort, Mr. "W. S. Crawfurd, 
Lord Poulett, Lord Falmouth, Lord Calthorpe, Mr. E. Brayley, 



600 SCARLET WOMEN. 

Lord Strafford, Mr. Bromsgrove, iand many others, titled and 
untitled, who are leaders among the racing aristocracy. The 
Marquis of Hastings, and the Duke of Newcastle, that day, 
were absent — the first in his grave, the other beggared by his 
extravagance, and an outcast among his peers. 

As the day grew apace, the swarms of people became more 
densely packed until all classes of the sporting multitude were 
represented. There was the " Welcher," who makes bets and 
does not pay when he loses, a low-sized, stumpy fellow, in cut- 
away frock coat and drab beaver hat, a huge horse's head pin 
sticking out of his gaudy, blue scarf, which is dotted with 
small white balls, and wearing a shaggy moustache, which he 
twists with the head of his cane, that has for a knob a nag's 
head, in bone-work. 

Yonder, stopping to ask for a noggin of gin from one of the 
proprietors of the numerous ginger beer and refreshment 
stands, is the London prize fighter — a model, in his way— r- 
thick set, broad in the loins, and having a murderous forehead 
and a battered face, from some recent encounter, one of those 
dangerous-looking, suspicious fellows, whom you may meet 
with any night wandering about the docks in Wapping, or 
lounging at the notched doorway of a tavern in Shoreditch, or 
Whitechapel. 

Sauntering this way, where I stand in a shady spot with my 
American friend, are two " heavy swells," dressed in the height 
of fashion, and mincing their vowels in a feminine manner; yet 
effeminate as their language sounds, they are both massive^ 
looking fellows, and now I recollect having seen both leaning 
out of the bow window of the Guard's Club, in Pall Mall, and 
one of the pair I have also noticed trooping his company at St. 
James' Palace, at the unusually early hour — for him — of nine 
o'clock, of a summer's morning. 

Men are gambling, and singing, and eating, and drinking, 
and betting shillings and sovereigns all around us, and my 
companion seems stunned by the noise and uproar which rises 
and swells in an indistinct way this hot July day, as we move 



ENGLISH MINSTRELSY. 601 

from jilace to place seeking a quiet nook' where we may com- 
mune together. 

There is suddenly a discordant hum and a party of strolling 
minstrels halt before a carriage and commence to serenade the 
fair lady listeners, who fling sixpences to them languidly. 
These minstrels have their faces blacked, and are appareled in 
hideous check coats with very small bodies, and have very large 
buttons sewed to the skirts, which are ornamented with ridicu- 
lously long tails. The songs generally sung by those wretched 
minstrels, are slangy, and sound senseless to an American's 
ear, as witness the following stanza which they chant with 
wide-mouthed refrain : — 

" Button up your waistcoat, button up your shoes, 
Have another liquor and throw away the blues, 
Be like me and good for a spree, 

From now till the day is dawning. 
For I am a member of the Rollicking Rams, 
Come and be a member of the Rollicking Rams, 
The only boys to make a noise, 

From now till the day is dawning." 

The course was lined and packed with every known manner 
of vehicle and equipage. There were drags, four-in-hands, 
dog-carts, landau's, tandem teams, ladies' pony chaises, phaetons, 
carryalls, clarences, broughams, and open barouches. Many 
of the turn-outs were adorned with the crests of noble families, 
and some few bore the princely cognizances of great Continen- 
tal houses. 

One of these large, roomy, and handsomely-constructed, open 
barouches, drawn by four grey horses, served as a focus for many 
glances drawn toward it. Some of the glances bestowed on the 
female occupants of the handsome barouche were very un- 
friendly — and when some proud patrician girl rode by, her eyes 
shot fire at the borrowed splendor of the three Scarlet Women, 
who reclined lazily upon the softly-cushioned scats, and no less 
hostile were the glances thrown on the graceful wavy figure of the 
handsome girl who sat her thorough-bred and silken-eared and 
shapely chestnut bay mare by the side of the barouche, and 
37 



602 



SCARLET WOMEN. 



1 



who bent over like a reed to chat with the principal female 
figure leaning back on the cushions. 

I looked at these four gaily dressed, handsome women, with 
their loud chatty manners, their indescribably bold flashes 
of the eye, their familiar and free conversation with the titled 
fools and giddy young lordlings, and baronets and rich young 
commoners, and as I looked I saw that these four women 
represented the Great Social Plague Spot of England. While 
I looked, a police inspector, from London, who had come down 
to this ordinarily quiet, Sussex town, to keep an eye on some 
distinguished pickpockets who were to attend tlie races, saunt- 
ered to where I stood with my friend, and as I had made his 
acquaintance in the English capital he was not long in inform- 
ing me as to the character of the magnificently attired women. 
"They are the four gayest women in England, Sir," said he, 

" Those four ladies — 
we call them ladies 
because we dare not 
call them anything 
else, they have so 
many protectors of 
rank and influence — 
are "Mabel Grey," 
"Ano.uyma," " Baby 
Hamilton," and 
"Alice Gordon." 
"Mabel Gray?" said 
'> my friend enquiringly, 
"I think I've heard 
of her before — which 
is she ?" 

"That's her, Sir, 
as is sitting back in 
the front seat with a 
plate of chicken on her lap, with the golden butterflies in her 
lace bonnet, and the splendid diamond cross hanging from her 
neck — that's the gal with the blue eyes and auburn hair. The 
gal that's holding the long necked green glass for that swell 




MABEL GREV. 



"THEY ARE OFF." G03 

to pour champagne into it, is "Baby Hamilton" — ah, she is a 
wild one — many's the thousand pounds the young Jook of Ham- 
ilton squandered on her, and so did the poor Marquis of Has- 
tings, poor fellow — wuss for him. The finest looking gal of all 
is that "Anonyma" gal as some of these fellows that has book 
eddication lias called her — they say it means "No Name," but 
I know she has a name, for it used to be Kate Bellingham 
when she came to London first. Oh, she's a high blooded one 
— just look at how she sits that chestnut mare — I'll warrant 
you that mare would bring six hundred guineas at Tattersall's 
— if she'd bring a pound — ye won't ketch her drinking in pul> 
lie, she's too proud of herself to do that — no. Sir, she wouldn't 
be seen taking a drink from the Prince of Wales himself at a 
public place like the Race Course. Now there's Alice Gordon," 
added the police officer, who began to grow loquacious in his 
description of these fair but frail and giddy beauties, "she's a 
quiet, orderly, young creature, and as pretty as a peach, poor 
little thing — God help her — she never knew a mother's care, 
and she was lost for want of a kind word and a loving heart 
to guide her young steps." 

Now the saddling bell has nmg amid the greatest excite- 
ment, and the multitude who have been flirting, eating, and 
drinking, betting, and playing at divers games of chance, be- 
come suddenly hushed, and a great quiet comes over the popu- 
lated fields, stands, and tents, as the jockeys ride forth to the 
starting point, five famous horses held in the leash and strain- 
ing their necks with avidity and equine eagerness for the race. 
The ladies of the demi-monde settled themselves well forward 
in tlieir seats. "Anonyma" swept by on her chestnut to get 
a good position for a look at the horses. "Mabel Grey" al- 
lowed her knife and fork, which she had been using on the 
unoffending chicken, to fall into her plate, and the tangled 
curls of " Baby Hamilton" reclined on her shoulders as a fool 
of a Guardsman gave her his arm to assist her to stand up in 
the drag, and handed her his glass to sweep the field. The 
stately looking footman who is bustling among the dishes and 
wine bottles, assisting "Anonyma's" butler in preparation for 



604 SCARLET WOMEN. 

the coming feast, stops in liis occupation to listen to tlic thun- 
dering roar of tlie crowd, and to look at the gallant animals 
as they come forward to the stand. The butler, who is a grave 
and elderly personage, receives his orders from "Anonyma," 
with dignity, and he is lost to sight among the game-hampers 
and the champagne bottles, and Moselle flasks, for a moment. 

Listen to that cheer and long-continued shout I They are 
off, they are off; and the whole vast swarm of human beings 
is aroused. The ladies clap their hands and utter weak sounds 
of joy or distress, and the cadgers, tramps, and more polished 
pickpockets, are now beginning to reap their harvest in the 
midst of the excitement and momentary frenzy. 

The race is a two-mile stretch, and only five horses are en- 
tered. The prize is the Goodwood Cup, valued at three hund- 
red sovereigns. 

Two of the horses entered are four-year-olds, and the others 
are three-year-olds. The great Jemsh banker and member of 
Parliament, Baron Rothschild, has entered " Restitution," a 
four year old, who is ridden by Daley, an Irish jockey of fame. 
Sir Frederick Johnstone's entry is " Brigantine," a three year 
old. Mr. Saville's "Blueskin," Lord Calthorpe's '^ Robes- 
pierre," and Lord Strafford's " Rupert," make up the number 
of horses who have darted by the Grand Stand in the storm of 
wild huzzas. 

"Anonyma," whose chestnut was pawing the turf in a frisky 
manner, grips the bridle of the blooded mare, and pulls hardily 
at her mouth. A number of roughs around a booth salute her 
with not very choice language, for she is known ;.t the races, 
and the blood mantles in her cheek and the crimson tide surges 
up to her temples as a coarse blackguard repeats an opprobious 
epithet, and before he can draw back she lays his cheek open 
with her dainty riding-whip, and giving the mare more rope, the 
crowd opens wide for her with a cheer, and she dashes across 
the Course on a canter, just as the Rothschild's jockey, with 
his head bent down to the mane of " Restitution," and his 
silken cap flying in the hot wind, sweeps by, " Blueskin " fol- 
lowing fast, and the great banker's jockey swerving aside 



"anonym A. 



005 



from his course, wins, by a miracle; "Restitution" having 
been for a moment blinded bj the long skirts of "Anonyma," 
in her mad canter across the tnrf, and now there is a 
huzza, and a rending, wild hurricane of applause, as Roths- 
child's colors go forward to the Weighing Stand, and " Resti- 
tution" is pronounced winner of the Goodwood Cup of 1869, 
"Robespierre" being a bad fourth, and "Rupert" coming in 
last of the field. 

Now the principal race of the day is ended, and great ac- 
claim having been given 
to the victor, the crowds 
disintegrate and separate 
into little knots for refresh- 
ments, and hard-faced fel- 
lows, in flashy costumes, 
may be seen pulling from 
capacious pockets, greasy 
wallets, to settle their 
debtsof "honor,"and much 
beer is drank among the 
humble people, and floods 
of costly wines are poured 
out in drags and dog-carts? 
and bright eyes and smil- 
ing lips meet one every- 
where, and there is a clat- 
ter of knives and forks, 
and a popping of corks in 
the vicinity of the carriages occupied by the Scarlet "Women 
of London, who are here to-day in swarms, and who arc ca- 
ressed and welcomed as if their position was assured and the 
dark shadow of a Shameful Life had not fallen upon thoni. 

Leaning over the side of the drag, and talking to Mabel Grey, 
are three of the " fastest" young men in-England, Lord Arthur 
Pelham Clinton (since dead), Courtenay, Earl of Devon, and 
the Duke of Newcastle, brother to Lord Arthur. All tliree are 
bankrupt in fortune as well as in morality. Lord Arthur's 




606 



SCARLET WOMEN. 



mother, a daughter of the former Duke of Hamilton, dishonored 
her husband, and there seems to be a taint in the blood of the 
young noble, who has been living on liis wits for years. He is 

a languid-looking fel- 
low, and does not look 
as if he could fall-to 
and saw a load of wood. 
Mabel Grey says to 
Lord Arthur, with a 
lisp: " Clinton, do take 
a bit of chicken and a 
glass of fizz. No ? 
Well then, take a glass 
of hock, like a dear 
good boy. You look 
awfully cut. What 
can be the matter with 
the man ?" 

Just under the shad- 
ow of the wide-spread- 
ing beech-tree, where 
the drag is stationed, 
an itinerant preacher is about to commence a phillipic against 
Vice and Crime. He could not have chosen a better location 
than this, where the ears of these Painted Women may be filled 
by him Avith some truths that they seldom seek after. 

"Alice Gordon," the fair-haired blonde, with the decpblue eyes, 
condescends to bestow a glance at the preacher, who, now that 
he is beginning to draw a crowd by his fiery invective, and 
denunciatory language, directs a look of scorn and pity at the 
Lost Women in the drag. The crowd, who naturally dislike 
women of the class of Lais and Aspasia, give encouragement 
to the squat-figured and harshly-spoken Boanerges. The swells 
around the drag, who are now joined by Sir Frederick John- 
stone, advise the Scarlet Women to tell the coachman to whip 
up the horses and " dwivc the dwag away from that beastly 
preacher — the howid little boah." 




"ALICE GORDON.' 



"MABEL GREY." 607 

The preacher tlumders at them, " Go, you gaudy libertines, 
with your harlots and your women of Sodom, England is cursed 
with such as you. But God will punish you all, and will smite 
you in your hour of pride. For what says the Book, whose 
pages you never open ; 

" The ungodly are froivard, even from their mother^s ivomh ; 
as soon as they are born they go astray, and speak lies. 

" They are venomous as the poison of a serpent, even like the 
deaf adder, that stoppeth her ears. 

" Break their teeth, God, in their mouths ; smite the jaw- 
bones of the Lions, Lord ; let them fall away like water that 
runneth apace ; and when they shoot their ai'roivs let them, be 
rooted out.''^ 

"Baby Hamilton," one of the women in the drag, shudders at 
these Inspired Words and grows pale, while "Anonyma," who 
canters up easily on her chestnut, asks Sir Frederick Johnstone : 

" Did you pull off a pot of money on " Brigantine," Sir Fred- 
erick ?" 

" No, the doose of it was I lost two thousand on my own 
horse. But I hedged and took 'Restitution' against the 
field, so I am not so badly plucked." 

And tliis is the entertainment and conversation of some of 
the hereditary rulers of England. Pardon me, reader, if I have 
brought you into such loose and unprincipled company. I did 
it to show you who are the female companions of a majority 
of the young English nobility. It is this class of young men 
who patronise these Social Pariahs, and look with contempt 
upon the manners of a respectable girl, and vote the conversa- 
tion of virtuous women as a bore. 

That woman with the sunny smile, laying back in the drag, 
toying with her fan — Mabel Grey — was, five years ago, a 
wretchedly-paid working girl, who eked out an existence as a 
shoe-binder, in a shop in Oxford street, London, on a })ittance 
of seven shillings a week. Now, the diamonds on lier fingers 
would purchase a comfortable villa, and around her throat, 
wliich is white as alabaster, is a necklace of pearls, that cost 
the Prince of Wales five thousand pounds, it is said. She rides 



G08 SCARLET WOMEN. 

every day in Rotten Row, the famous ride and fashionable 
drive in Hyde Park, and her skirts often touch the garments 
of the Princess of Wales as they pass each other in the crowd- 
ed Row. And certainly the Princess has no reason to look 
pleasantly at Mabel Grey. Mother to five children, and daugh- 
ter of the Vikings, with clear, unsullied Norse blood in her 
veins, she may well question herself, when alone, " Why did I 
marry a profligate and blackguard?" 

Mabel Grey is the original of Boucicault's "Formosa," audit 
was she wlio gave a name to Dan Godfrey's famous " Mabel 
Waltz." Godfrey is the leader of the Guard's band, and the mu- 
sician thought that it would be received as a delicate compli- 
ment by his aristocratic patrons, to call a delicious piece of dance 
music by the Christian name of the chief of England's Hetairae. 

In every shoi>window tlie features of Mabel Grey are flaunted 
at one along with the portraits of Nillson, Patti, the Queen, the 
Princess of Wales, and other virtuous and good women. You may 
meet her and "Anonyma" at the Opera, at the Chiswick Flower 
Show, at Kensington Gardens, and other fashionable resoits, 
mingling unrebuked among the noblest ladies in the land. She 
has a sumptous villa at St. John's Wood, Brompton, a su])urb 
of London, and in her stables are constantly kept twelve to 
fifteen blooded animals for the saddle or for driving — these 
horses being the gifts of lier numerous aristocratic admirers. 
She dines off dishes of silver and gold, antl has a host of ser- 
vants. At Ascot she induced the Prince of Wales to bet on a 
certain horse, wlicreby he lost the nice little sum of $100,000, 
or X 20,000. 

And it is this bold, bi'azcn, and bad woman, who divides the 
lieart of the Prince of Wales with tlie Princess Alexandra, his 
lawful wife and the mother of his children, the other half being 
owned by Mabel Grey, together witli his pocket-book, which he 
is most apt to keep closed to all others. 

She was the cause of the ruin of Captain Milbanke, of the 
Guards — a distant relation of tiie deceased wife of Lord Byron, 
I believe — and slie has destroyed dozens of young men in their 
fortunes, social position, and masculine character. 



"MABEL GREY AT HOME. 



609 



And here, I suppose,! majLc pardoned for giving a pen and 
ink description of the interior of her palatial residence at St. 
John's Wood, Brompton, where she resides, by one who saw 
and conversed with her there : 

"The salon was about sixty feet long by thirty wide, and the 
ceiling was probably fifteen feet from the velvet carpet. Vel- 
vet decorated the walls, hanging in crimson folds somewhat 
like the arras hangings that I had seen in some of tlic mil- 
dewed chateaux of the French nobles. There was, in the front 
of the salon, an immense mirror framed in gold, and inside of 
the golden frame was a sub-frame of crimson velvet. The 
lounges, chairs, ottomans, and buffets, were trimmed with vel- 




MABEL GREY AT IlOMli. 



vet of the same warm color. The carpet on the floor was a 
Gobelin, in which was worked a pictured design of the port of 
Marseilles, at a cost of two thousand pounds. There were 
richly carved statues of Parian, bronzes, anticjuc and ricldy- 
paintcd vases, shells standing on golden tripods, caricatures of 



610 SCARLET WOMEN. 

dogs' lieaQs, tigers' heads, and the bodies of serpents, with 
glistening eyes — all of which articles had more or less of the 
precious metals in their composition. Pictures of Diana of 
Poictiers, Margaruite de Yalois, Theroigne de Mericourt, Anna 
Bolcyn, Louisa de Yalliere, and a supposed mistress of John 
Wilkes Booth, of whom I had never before heard, adorned the 
walls of the salon. 

These were all done in oil, well painted, and magnificently 
framed. The place of honor, however, was reserved for Ninon 
de I'Enclos, the mistress of one of the Bourbon Kings. This 
picture was a beautifulworkof art, and represented the famous 
beauty of the old French Court, reclining opposite a mirror. 
There was a small figure piece by Meissonier, and a statue of 
Minerva of pure marble, from whose spear head depended a 
small but richly chased gas-chandelier, of six burners, that 
spread a flood of light all over the salon. A hundred thousand 
dollars would not have purchased the furniture, carpets, 
statues, paintings, and ornaments, in this gorgeous apartment, 
to say nothing of the diamonds which covered the neck and 
arms of the beautiful but frail mistress of the mansion. 

And now for Mabel herself. This distinguished personage, 
as she lounged on the tiger-skin, looked to me a little above the 
medium height of women ; her hair, of a rich, silky brown, full 
and lustrous, was looped in coils at the top of ihe back of her 
head a la Grecque, and was trimmed with small red flowers. 
From her ears were pendant long, oval, diamond ear-rings, and 
from her snowy neck was hung a necklace, of pearl shells inter- 
woven with diamonds, worth a monarch's ransom. Her arms 
were bare and rounded, and her shoulders were decollete. She 
was attired in a loosely flowing robe of pink velvet — (he only 
thing pink I saw in the apartment — and at her waist was a 
plain thin cincture of gold. She wore her dress without hoops, 
which allowed the folds of her costly robe to fall over her 
shapely limbs in studied yet artistic confusion. On the differ- 
ent fingers of both hands were rings of topaz, sapphire, ruby, 
emerald, amethyst, and opal, fastened by golden keepers. She 
had crimson slippers, embroidered in gold, and iu her right 



I 



PERSONNEL. Cll 

hand she ■waved lazily, to and fro, a fan of costly fcatlrers. The 
woman herself was a magnificent animal to look at, with a spice 
of the tiger shining out of her clear, lustrous eyes. 

The neck was well poised and finely cut, as were the face 
and shoulders. The mouth was large and full of good, white, 
regular teeth, which she displayed often during the conversa- 
tion to advantage. The nose was irregular, pert, and snub- 
bish, and her chin was like the cone of a ripe peach. Some- 
thing there was brazen in this woman's face, despite the mag- 
nificence reigning in the apartment. Her voice was loud and 
sharp, and her gestures were unladylike, though she endeavored 
to atone for these defects by a studied ease which occasion- 
ally lapsed into a masculine freedom. She was continually 
showing her rings, her fan, and her slippers — and seemed care- 
less of the little prudential details that go to make up the man- 
ner of a virtuous woman." 

" Anonyma" is, in many respects, a different woman from Ma- 
bel Grey. This celebrated Lorette, unlike her frail sisters, has 
a taste, or perhaps affects to have a taste, for literature. Orig- 
inally a clergyman's daughter, and born and bred in Sussex, 
she had, when she came first to London, all the charms of a 
fresh country girl, and, although exposed for a long time to 
temptation in her station as a governess in the family of a rich 
commoner, whose name is now often .before the public, she held 
on her way firmly as slie could, and would have succeeded had 
not she met a man who outraged her by a false or mock mar- 
riage. 

The poor girl, whose real name ;s Brandling, when she found 
that she was deserted with a few pounds in her pocket, went 
almost mad. But she had to starve or else become what she 
is now. Her father, overworked in his curacy at XloO a year, 
and having a family of five children, refused to admit her to 
his home, and gave as a reason tliat it would be setting a bad 
example to his parishioners, which he, as a minister of the 
Gospel could not do. Driven from licr birthplace, with despair 
in her heart, she fled to London, and, sinking at once into the 
slough of iniquity, was not heard of for a year, wlien she 



612 SCARLET WOMEN. 

emerged in grandeur at the opera in the company of a wealthy 
banker, who has since failed and fled the country. 

The girl, from her reticent disposition, her lady-like man- 
ner, and the mystery attending her appearance in the world — 
no one being able to tell her exact position — received the name 
of "Anonyma" from the Saturday Review. Unlike the other 
women of her sex, this girl was never formerly seen in the 
company of any woman whose position was affected by the 
slightest breath of reproach. In the Park she never made 
acquaintances, and all notes sent to her were sent back to the 
writers. To become acquainted with "Anonyma," though the 
seeker after her intimacy were a prince, it was necessary to 
have a formal introduction to the lady. 

The "Kitten" is a young lady well known at the Cremorne 
Gardens for her expensive suppers, loud voice, and magnificent 
pony carriage, before which she drives sometimes a brace of 
Shetland ponies, three in a tandem. At tlie Cremorne she 
always puts ice-cream in her champagne, and never drinks any 
light or thin wines, as she says that they do not agree with her 
constitution. I saw her at the Ascot Races in company with 
Mabel Grey, the "Kitten" being mounted on a splendid roan, 
which she managed with the skill of an old army officer, and a 
dozen men belonging to the best known clubs in London were 
clustering about her, and assisting her to luncheon, looking after 
the wine, or doing a luindred little errands which women of 
her character always find for men to do in a public place. The 
"Kitten" is a blonde, with black eyes, a pretty, babyish face, 
a dimpled chin, a profusion of golden hair which is not dyed, 
and a capital scat in the saddle. She is always gloved to a 
nicety, and her ensemble is of the best kind. She has a pert 
fashion of saying sharp or impudent things, and this seems to 
be the chief accomplishment of all this class of shameless 
women. They know the stable-talk and the slang of the bet- 
ting ring, and of the hunt, but nothing more. The "Kitten," 
five years ago — she is now 22 — was a coryphee in the ballet of 
a London theatre, at the magnificent salary of fifteen shillings 



BABY HAMILTON.' 



G13 



a week, and now she has an annuity of <£ 2,000 settled upon 
her by a young fool of a lord, who has no better use for his 
money. 

The wardrobe of Alice Gordon, another of the Hetairag, is 
valued at <£12,000. She is a brilliant horse woman. 

"Baby Hamilton" is 
another celebrity of the 
Half-World. Many 
stories are told about 
the recklessness of this 
girl. She forced her 
way to a meeting in 
one of the shires when 
the hounds were all as- 
sembled, and followed 
the hunt, despite the 
remonstrances of the 
master, and regardless 
of the fact that m'ore 
than half the ladies 
who were present left 
the field on her appear- 
ance in a hunting cos- 
tume. She made a bet 
while in Paris with a wild young duke that she would get a re- 
cognition from the Empress Eugenie. The stake was a thor- 
oughbred of the young duke's which she desired to liavc for 
her own use. The bet was made, and while the Empress was 
riding in the Bois, the "Baby," magnificently dressed and 
mounted, placed herself in the way of the Empress, and bowed 
quite reverentially. The Empress looked at her for an instant, 
and, thinking that it was some English lady of rank, bowed very 
graciously in return. The young duke — who is, by tlie way, a 
relative of the Empress by marriage — saw the salutation. It 
was too good to keep, and accordingly, before the next night, 
the "Baby" had to leave Paris, by order of the Prefect of Po- 
lice. 




BABY HAMILTON. 



CHAPTER XLIV. 



CHEAP LODGING HOUSES. 




NE night, having made an appointment with 
one of the Scotland Yard detectives, I met 
him as I liad promised, punctually, at the 
India House, which is situated at the junction 
of Victoria and Dean streets, Westminster. 
Be it remembered, that Westminster is a 
borough, and sends two Members of Parliament, yet it is a part 
and a portion of the metropolis of London. 

He came muffled in his coat, and, having saluted me, asked 
me if I was ready to accompany him, to visit some of the low 
lodgings houses that abound in a certain part of Westmins- 
ter, at the back of Millbank Prison, which fronts the river be- 
tween Vauxhall and Lambeth Bridges. 

It was the night before the great Derby Race, at which 
nearly all England is represented, peer and peasant, tradesman, 
beggar, burglar, and pickpocket. On such a night all the Lon- 
don lodging-houses were sure to be full of tramps. 

Briefly, I said I was ready to accompany him. and without 
further conversation we penetrated to the darkest recesses of 
the borough of Westminster, going down Dean into Orchard 
street, through Orchard street into New-Pye street, down Great 
Peter street, through Holland street, and so into a short, dark 
street, called Med way street, at the back of the Greycoats 
School. 

All these streets which I have named have low lodging 
houses, and were filled this night Avith tramps, vagrants, pcd- 



THE WESTMINSTER SLUMS. Glo 

dlers, itinerant showmen, vagabonds, and thieves. Great Pe- 
ter street is so called to distinguish it from Little Peter street, 
and both streets being within a stone's throw of the Abbey of 
Westminster, derive their names from tlie dedicatory title of 
the ancient and world-renowned abbey which was called, at one 
time, and is yet known in official documents, as the "Abbey 
Church of St. Peter's, Westminster." 

Medway street leads into the Horseferry Road, which is at 
one end a continuation of Lambeth Bridge, and at the other 
end is flanked by Holland street. 

My blue-coated friend said to me, after pulling out a small 
dark lantern, which he used in these dark rookeries and streets 
by the water side : 

" The worst place I can take you to in Westminster, and 
perhaps in London, Sir, barrin always ' Paddy's Goose,' in 
Ratcliffe Highway, is the lodging house kept by ' Jack Scrag,' 
or ' Damnable Jack,' as he is called on account of his swearin' 
— in Medway street. I can't guarantee that you will bring your 
watch or pocket-book back, but I will save your life if you get 
in a row, and that will be as much as 1 can do. If there are 
any thieves there they will be afraid of me, but the roughs and 
tramps, who are out of the law's reach, are up to anything, and 
will break your leg or arms, or mine either, without talking 
twice about it." 

On our way to the Slums of Westminster I entered a cheap 
lodging house, in which the lodgers were preparing their 
evening meal, for which they paid four-pence to the proprietor. 
A potato was given each person with a small junk of broiled or 
fried meat, and a tin-skittle full of washy tea or coffee, snch as 
is given to steerage passengers at sea, was handed to tlic tramps 
and beggars, who frequented the place. 

The room was large and lofty, with smoky rafters, and a 
number of men, women, and boys, were sitting, standing, and 
reclining on the floor or on chairs, but nearly all were eating 
like ravenous beasts from tin-plates or earthen-ware platters. 

A man might purchase a herring for a half-penny at any of 
the refuse sales in the markets, and bring it here and toast 



G16 CHEAP LODGING HOUSES. 



1 



it over the huge fire for an additional half-penny, and many of 
the oceupants of this gipsy^ookiug place were employed in the 
pleasing occupation of cooking as we left the place on our jour- 
ney after an adventure. 

Mcdway street, as I have before mentioned, is quite short, 
and therefore it was not long before I saw a light of more bril- 
liancy than those around it, bursting from the window of the 
first story of a brick building, the bricks being set off about 
the windows with trimmings of dark blue stone. Above the 
door were painted the emblems of the Lion and the Unicorn, 
which are everywhere displayed in English cities, and a lamp 
of a square shape projected from tlie doorway, throwing a dead 
and unwholsome-lilvo light upon the street and sidewalk. Iil 
the Avindow a sign was painted, indicating that lodgings were 
to be had for four-pence a night for single persons, and also a 
notification that "boiling water" was "always ready." 

The house was probably a hundred years old, as near as I 
could tell by its old beams, which were bare, the besmeared 
and notched lintels on which names, efiigies, and initials, had 
been carved, from time immemorial, by lodgers, thieves, and 
cadgers.- There was a bar, and glistening beer-pumps, and 
pewter noggins, and copper measures, were hung np behind 
the counter. Against tlie walls, which were environed by brass 
railing to keep intruders from making too free or breaking the 
glasses if a fight should occur, was inscribed on a tin plate of 
greasy hue the words : 



I 



John Scragg <fe Co., 
Wine and Liquor Merchants. 
Beds, 4d. a Night. 



The proprietor, a fellow with beetle brows, a furzy black 
beard, and a fustian jacket well greased, sat on a worn bench 
near tlie beer pump. 

" Good evenin, Mr. Scragg," said the detective to the ras- 
cally-looking fellow. 



AT MR. SCRAGG's. 



619 



" Good evcnin — the same to yon, Bolshy — arc you lookin for 
lodgins to-night?" said lie in reply. 

"Well, not exzacldy — I came with a friend o' mine to take 
a look at the Crib — have yon many lodgers to-night, Jack ?" 




" DAMNABLE JACK." 



" Mayhap a matter o' fifty or more. So you wants to look 
at the Crib, do ye ? Well, I ha' no hobjections so as ye don't 
disturb my lodgers. They are a precious set o' lambs, and be- 
long to the best families in the Kingdom, so I keeps heverythink 
quiet, sort a like, as they have a great deal a money bet on the 
races at the Darby, to-morrow." 

' " Could you give my friend a bed, to-night, and he'll pay you 
well. He doesn't want to go back to his hotel it's so far at 
the West End, and he might lose hiself in this big city. 
^ " Give yer friend a bed? -D — n my lieyes, I should think I 
could ! A dozen beds if he likes — and yourself, too, me heartv." 
38 



620 CHEAP LODGING H0USE3. 

"But no pocket-picking, Jack — no 'plant' agin liim. Keep 
hoff yer ' Bug-hunters,' or ye'll get in trouble for it, Jack." 

" Do I look like a man 'ud permit sich goings on in my 
'Ouse," said Damnable Jack, indignantly, and looking with an 
injured face at the policeman, "Wot, in my 'ouse,vich is pat- 
ronized by the Nobility and Gentry ? I hopes not. Ye'll not 
find a man or woman 'ere as Avould 'crack a case' 'or 'break 
a drum,' and the 'Kidsmen' are, all on them, as perlite as 
young Swells, they is, on me 'onor." 

I followed Mr. Scragg through an unpaved hall-way or pas- 
sage, and into a small court, from which the lodging house 
keeper diverged to the right, and knocking at a door in an 
extension of the main building, it was opened to us, and we 
entered the apartment. The apartment had a low roof, and the 
stench from the place was most terrible. In a room about 
fifty feet long by thirty in width, at least sixty persons were 
sleeping, or sitting up on their coarse, common flock beds, 
some smoking, others eating and drinking, and a few were 
playing cards. 

There was a high, old-fashioned fireplace, in the apartment, 
without coals, and the walls of plaster were very dirty, and 
broken in many places, showing the bare laths. 

Prints of highwaymen adorned the walls, among which was 
conspicuous Claude Duval leaping a five-barred gate on horse- 
back, and a posse of constables, in bobwigs, in full chase. 
There was also a daub of paint representing the execution of a 
wife-murderer, at Newgate, and a copy of the murderer's last 
speech, framed alongside of the other print. These, with a 
cheap engraving of Sir Robert Peel, completed the list of works 
of art in the place. 

There was a murmur which grew into quite a hub-bub as I 
entered the apartment, and not a few of the lodgers vented 
their surprise or disgust at my appearance, jointly with that of 
the "Peeler," as they called the policeman. 

" Wot the blazes does that Swell want in 'ere," said an old 
cadger, who was reclining on a bed on the floor, trimming his 
toe-nails with a jack-knife preparatory to going to bed, much 



THE DIRTY CADGER. 621 

to the edification of a joung girl who sat by his side on the 
bed, and could not have been more than fifteen years of age. 

" Mebbe he's a swell pick-pocket, or fogle-hunter (handker- 
chief thief,)" said the innocent young creature. 

" Hit stands to reason he can't be a fogle hunter, 'cos he's 
with the blessed Peeler," said the Cadger. 

" Well, mebbe he's wiring for the perlice," said the young 
girl, "and wants to ketch some on us for a 'dummy.'" 

"Never mind, Moll, he doesn't want us, and we'll go to sleep, 
cos we've got to be on the tramp, early in the morning, for the 
Darby." 

This man was forty years of age, and the young girl, not 
more than fifteen years old, was his mistress, as I afterward 
learned. 

The policeman signified to the proprietor, " Damnable Jack," 
that he wanted to get a bed where we might sleep together for 
the night. 

" I hardly got a bed left but one and ye's are welcome to it, 
and for that matter it will hold five men and women, if I want- 
ed to put 'em in it. Come here Phil, and give these gents a 
bed — they wants to taste the blessed sweets of lodgin house 
life. Give them their fill of it. Put them m the ' Lord Chan- 
cellor's' bed. Its the best in the house." 

Let it be understood, that all the beds in the apartment were 
placed upon the bare floor, and that the mattresses were filled 
with dirty straw, which bulged out of their sides, or rags, and 
gave the room a close, fetid odor. For covering, there were 
dirty canvass quilts, made of the same stuff from which sails 
or potato sacks are fashioned. There were no sheets whatever, 
and the pillows and bolsters were stuffed as were the mattresses 
with rags or straw. 

Near the fire-place was a bare space of smoothly laid brick, 
without any pretence of bedding at all, which was chalked out 
in a number of compartments, and each of these compartments 
was chalked out for a human being to sleep upon. By reposing 
on the bare, cold floor, the lodger saved a penny and got his 
bed for three-pence instead of four-pence. 



622 CHEAP LODGING HOUSES. 

Among tlic sixty i)ersons present, there were at least twenty- 
five women, composed of female tramps, vagrants, prostitutes, 
coster-girls, and peddlers of different kinds of commodities, 
which they had to leave in an adjoining room that was locked 
up by the Deputy Lodging Master until the time of leaving their 
beds early in the morning, when the merchandise was delivered 
to its owners. 

It was by the advice of an Inspector of Police that I made 
this essay to sleep in a cheap lodging house. He informed me 
that it was the only method of olitaining a clear knowledge of 
the habits and practices of the lodgers. 

The "Lord Chancellor's" bed, as Damnable Jack called it, 
facetiously, was the best, from its appearance, in the room, and 
was at the farthest corner. It was generally used by the Dep- 
uty Lodging Master, and had a little chintz screen around it, 
and the bed itself, which had comparatively clean sheets and 
bed-furniture, was elevated a few feet from the floor on a sort 
of trestle work. 

The charge for this bed was a shilling to each of us, and the 
policeman and myself laid down upon it in our clothes, the 
policeman having a revolver in his side pocket, upon which he 
kept his right hand during the night, whether he slept or had 
his eyes open. 

I could not sleep in the terrible hole for several hours, and, 
in fact, did not think of doing so, as I was eager to watch the 
proceedings of the Scum of London, of which the lodgers were 
composed. 

Many of the young girls had not retired when we came in, 
and a few of them now began to divest themselves of their 
clothing, without shame or compunction on their part, or sur- 
prise on the part of their fellow lodgers, excepting that now 
and then some low-bred ruffian would pour forth a torrent of 
obscenity when some of the female lodgers exposed portions of 
their filthy bodies. 

The place was swarming with veraain, bed-bugs, roaches, and 
body parasites, in countless numbers, and this was one reason 
why many of the female lodgers stripped themselves to lie down, 



THE SCUM OP LONDON. 623 

for some of the beds were so thickly packed that it was impos- 
sible for the Deputy Lodging Master to pass through the room 
without treading upon an exposed hand or foot, and in such a 
case, blasphemous and vile execrations were heaped upon his 
devoted head by the lodgers. This he bore with the greatest 
indifference as if he had never heard a word of it. The lodo:- 
ers hoped by stripping naked to avoid having any of the vermin 
cling to their clothing — a wise precaution, as I found. 

Men, women, and children, without regard to age, sex, con- 
dition, or kindred, slept together in this room, and as the night 
advanced the stench from their hot, loathsome bodies, rose 
like a hellish incense and nearly smothered me with its fumes. 
There the breath of each lodger was worse than the odor of a 
charnel house, so that I deemed it a wonder as I sat up in bed 
looking through a rent in the chintz curtain which enclosed our 
bed, a lamp burning faintly on a table the while, that sixty of 
God's creatures could sleep this way night after night, sum- 
mer and winter, and yet be able to eat, drink, sleep, marry, 
beget children, and still thrive like deadly nightshade, to 
poison London and its neighborhood with their reeking effluvia. 

About three o'clock in the morning I heard a hammering, 
squashing sound, and looking from under the chintz curtain, I 
was first astonished and then disgusted to see a wan-looking, 
cadaverous personage, from whom the most frightful snoring 
had proceeded during the early part of the night, hammering 
with the heel of his shoe at some dark moving objects, which 
he, every moment, scraped from his bed and placing them on 
the floor smashed at them in a raging and furious way with his 
shoe heel, taking care the while to keep up a steady stream of 
curses from his lips. He saw me looking at him and said : 

"Well, neighbor, wot d'ye think of this. I pays four-pence 
for my bed, and here I am a-fighting to keep off the blessed bugs, 
for my life. I got myself gloriously drunk last night, to sleep, 
so that the wipers might not wake me up, but all the gin in 
Lunnon could n't make a man sleep while the wermin are in 
the bed-clothes. I have took out and killed a bushel, more or 
less, of 'em, in the last half hour, but there's plenty more of 'em, 
Lord bless you." 



624 CHEAP LODGING HOUSES. 

This was the keystone of the edifice of my disgust. Too 
much of a good thing is said to be of no practical benefit to any 
one, and there was such a richness of bed-bugs and body para- 
sites to be found in "Damnable Jack's" lodging house, that 
I thought I would not farther trouble his hospitality, and touch- 
ing the guardian of the place upon the shoulder, who started 
up in a frightened way as if he were attacked, I left Mr. 
Scragg's lodgings, and took a walk in the cool morning air as 
far as Westminster Bridge, where I sat until day-break, look- 
ing at the Parliament House, and the silent river with its 
numerous craft. 

Before 1 left the accursed place, the policeman pointed to a 
pail of foul water standing in a corner, that had been fresh 
over night, and which had now had a thick scum on its top 
produced by so many poisonous lungs. 

It is needless to say that I took a good warm bath early that 
morning, more than satisfied with my experience of the pre- 
vious night. 

Of this class of lodging houses, there are, in London, I be- 
lieve, about seventy-five, capa])le of accommodating any num- 
ber of lodgers that the proprietors may see fit to stow away in 

their dens. 

Some idea maybe formed of the manner in which the poorer 
classes of the London artisans are herded together from the 
fact that in the Inner Ward of St. George's Parish the number 
of families apportioned to the dwellings are so largely in ex- 
cess of the room which they ought to occupy that all kinds of 
frightful distempers are common in these hell-dens. I give a 
table to show how human beings are crowded in this district : 

Dwellings. No. of FamiUes.i Beds. No. of ramilies. 

Sin^'le room to each family, 929 One bed to each family, - 623 

TwS rooms to ditto, - - 408 1 Two " " - - 638 



Three " " - - 94 

Four ic » . - 17 

Five i< " - - 8 

Six « " . - 4 

Seven " " - - 1 

Ei<rht *\ « - - 1 

Not ascertained, - - 3 

1,465 



Three " " - 1^4 

Four " « - - 21 

Five » « - 8 

Six « " - - 3 

Seven " « - 1 

Dwellings without a bed, - 7 

Not ascertained, - - 10 

1,465 



TEN IN A BED. 



625 



Among the most munificent philanthropists who have built 
model lodging houses, for the poor and needy, I may enumer- 
ate Miss Burdett Coutts, and George Peabody. The former 
has expended nearly 



X500,000 in erecting 
model lodging houses for 
the poor, and the amount 
which was donated for the 
same purpose by Mr. Pea- 
body exceeded a million 
and a half of dollars. 

In speaking of Mr. Pea- 
body, I must not omit to 
state the fact that the 
Londoners, to show their 
appreciation of his philan- 
thropy, have erected to him 
a magnificent bronze stat- 
ue at the rear of the 
Royal Exchange in their city, which was publicly uncovered 
by the Prince of Wales during the life-time of the late philan- 
thronist. 




STATUE OF GEORGE TEABODY. 





CHAPTER XLV. 

A TRA^IP IN THE BY-WAYS. 

EEAT as London may believe itself to be 
in works of benevolence and philanthropy, 
there are spots in that mighty city which 
no one should visit without an oflicer of 
the law in his company, to warn him 
^^^^ from the pitfalls and dangers which will 
"^'"^" beset his pathway. 
One evening, feeling rather dispirited and uncomfortable, 
while sitting in the coffee-room of the Langham Hotel, a thought 
struck me tliat I might fnid amusement or novelty in some 
way by taking a tour through the city, and accordingly I called 
a cabman from the stand, in Upper Regent street, and, deter- 
mining to make an effort to dissipate the blues, I jumped into 
the '^lansom" and told the driver, an old weathcr-l)caten looking 
fellow, witli a buttoned-up coat and dirty neck-cloth, and weai^ 
ing a black silk hat, which had once been quite respectable, but 
was now utterly wrecked— to "drive me anywliore in London 
—I don't care where as long as I can see something to interest 
me." 

The driver, a well known character, who bore the title of 
" Old Smudge " among liis brethren on the cab stand, and who 
was always in trouble with the police, replied ; 

"Where shall I take you. Sir? Would you like to take a 
look at the river? Or, mayhap you nn-glit wish to see a dog 
fight, or a ratting match— the Americans are partial to ratting 
matches — I know some on 'em arc !" 



THE LONDON CABBIES. 



62T 



" Take me anywhere," said I from the recesses of the cab 
in which I had ensconsced myself. 

These London Cabbies are, as a general thing, the most 
provoking and abusive 
fellows in the world, but 
their usefulness cannot 
be denied Vjyany per- 
son who has experienced 
the delight of having a 
cab to hail when at- 
tacked suddenly Ijy the 
often recurring rain 
storms, which serve to 
keep the atmosphere of 
Great Britain's capital 
in a state of perpetual 
moistiu'e. There are 
two kinds of Cabs — the 
" hansom," a two wheel- 
ed vehicle, which falls 
back on its wheels, and is drawn by a single horse, the cabman 
sitting over your head with the reins elevated in his hands, 
and stretching through a metal ring in the roof to the collar 
of the horse. Then there are folding doors which can be closed 
to keep mud and dust from entering the cab, and a movable 
window fastened to the interior of the roof that can be 
hoisted or let down at will, and is most serviceable in case of 
rain or other inclement weather. 

Then there is the " four wheeler," as it is called, a cal) which 
is also drawn by one horse, but is built something after the 
fashion of the American coupe or brougham. This vehicle 
has four wheels, and is more comfortal)le and roomy than the 
"Hansom." The rates for transportation are higher, however, 
and the four-wheelers are used by a better class of people. 
There are six thousand one-horse cabs registered in London, of 
which number 2,352 are "six day" cabs, whose proprietors do 
not allow of their use on Sundays ; and of " seven day" cabs, 




OLD SMUDGE — THE CABBY. 



628 



A TRAMP IN THE BY-WAYS. 



which are constantly traversing the streets, there are as many 
as 3,366. These cabs are all licensed, and their owners pay, 
annually, into the Municipal Treasury as large a sum as <£10,- 
000. The legal rate of fare in a " hansom," is sixpence a 
mile, and for a " four-wheeler," one shilling per mile, but the 
cabbies charge strangers any fare they can get. 

"Leave me alone, Sir, and I'll show you some of the sights 




"a hansom cab." 

of Lunnon town," said " Old Smudge," in a hoarse voice from 
the top of the cab in reply to my anxious enquiry as to where 
we were traveling. We were then some distance from the 
"West End of the City, and from the noises which every few 
minutes attracted our attention, I fancied that the cab was 
being driven in the direction of the Thames. I saw, dimly, 
the masts of the shipping and the Docks, with their adaman- 
tine fronts frowning down upon me. 

The cab was stopped suddenly, and the horse was brought 



A SOIREE AT A RAT PIT. 629 

up on its hind legs by a jerk of the reins from " Old Smudge," 
who was already in conversation at the door of a beer shop, 
which was illuminated, and had a large number of rough-man- 
nered customers standing around its entrance. They were a suffi- 
ciently hard looking set to make a stranger think of his safety. 

"This is 'Jack Barley's " Convivial Pup," ' Sir," said the 
cabman to me as I climbed out of the "hansom." "This is 
the finest rat-pit in Lunnon, Sir." 

I had often heard of Mr. Barley before, and now I saw him 
face to face, a most villainous and repulsive looking beast with 
a scarcely healed cicatrice in his jaw, and a couple of bleary 
holes under his black brows, miscalled eyes. Mr. Barley was 
famous in his way, and enjoyed distinction among a certain 
class. None could tell the breed of a dog, the age of a spaniel, 
the pluck of a terrier, or the gouging and milling abilities of a 
middle weight bruiser, with Professor Barley. In such mat- 
ters his judgment was final and conclusive along the Thames 
bank for some distance. 

The proprietor escorted us through a small bar, which was 
ornamented with the usual sporting emblems found in low Lon- 
don tap rooms, and after descending a stone stairs, I found 
myself in a room beneath the ground floor, with small circular 
benches ranged in a cramped fashion to the ceiling. On 
these seats about one hundred men, of all grades in the sport- 
ing class, were seated. There were a few " gentlemen," God 
save the mark, a brace of attorney's clerks, an officer of some 
line regiment, and the rest of the audience were of a miscel- 
laneous character. 

There was a rat pit below the benches, a square enclosure 
with a board fence about four feet high, enclosing it, the boards 
being whitewashed, and the flooring of the pit having saw-dust 
scattered over it. 

The only light in this dreary and subterraneous den came 
from six greasy, unvarnished tin lanterns, in which half a 
dozen of cheap tallow candles were fixed, and these flickered 
and sputtered with great malevolence on the rascally faces of 
the men who swarmed around the pit. 



630 



A TRAMP IN THE BY-WAYS. 



I heard a squealing noise, and I saw a lad bring in a long 
and huge flat wire cage, which was swarming with gray, black, 
and brown rats. "Way was made for the youth to enter the 
pit with his cage of live rodents. Jumping in he opened 
the cage, and thrusting his forearm fearlessly through the door 
he drew forth, one by one, over fifty large and ferocious rats 
and threw them in a heap in the pit. These animals ran about 
in a confused way for a few minutes, and looked with an almost 
human and beseeching look into the murderous faces which 
were gathered around the pit. Then another cage was handed 
to the young man, and the same ceremony was performed again 
until there were one hundred and five rats in the centre of the 
pit. 




"one hundred rats in NKNK MliStll-a. ' 



There was to be a match for fifty pounds, the proprietor of 
the pit having matched his dog " Skid," a wiry and ferret- 
eyed little terrier, to kill one hundred rats in nine minutes. 
Bets were now made against and for the dog, that he would 
or would not kill the rats in the time named, and the excite- 
ment ran high as the little venomous dog was placed in the 



"skid's" battle with the rats. 631 

pit carefully by his master amid considerable applause from 
the roughs. 

It was simply disgusting to witness that dreadful little ter- 
rier run at each rat, shake him for a second or two in the air 
and then drop him quite dead on the floor of the pit, while the 
roughs encouraged him to his work with shouts when the rat 
was destroyed quickly, but occasionally when a big and fero- 
cious rat was attacked and showed fight in return, and when 
the terrier seemed to hang back for a moment, a perfect storm 
of curses and obscene epithets were rained on the unfortunate 
canine. Before five minutes had elapsed the whitewashed board 
sides and flooring of the Rat Pit were daubed with splaslies of 
blood, and the little terrier was foaming at the lips, and his 
glossy hide was flecked with dark smudgy stains. AVhen eight 
minutes and forty seconds had elapsed, " Skid " snapped the 
neck of the last rat, and now there was nothing left in the pit 
but a large pool of blood on which sawdust was quickly heaped, 
and a bleeding mass of heaving and dying rats. 

Great cheering rewarded the efforts of. " Skid," who was taken 
up tenderly, almost lovingly by his master ; and now being very 
sick at the stomach from the disgusting sight I left the place 
and took the cab, cogitating the while on what I had seen. 

Disgusting as the sight of the rat butchery had proved, I 
afterwards learned that some two hundred men earn a living 
in London, and its suburbs, in catching rats alive for the use 
of tlie rat-pits. Of this number a great many, liowever, are 
paid extra by persons who wish to drive the vermin from their 
dwellings, and have no means of doing so but by calling in 
professional rat-catchers. 

Some fifteen or twenty of these professional rat-catchers pur- 
sue their dangerous calling in the London sewers, preferring 
to catch those found in drains to the house rats, who are 
not as ferocious as the former. Beside, the sewer rat will 
fight a terrier longer and more savagely than a house rat, and 
as this affords good sport, the sewer rat is at a premiimi in 
the market. 

These rat-catchers traverse the sewers by night, and carry 



632 



A TRAMP IN THE BY-WAYS. 



lanterns and a long wire basket with lids and a handle of the 
same material. They use ointment which they rub on their hands 
and with this same composition they cover their arms, which is 




THE KAT CATCHER. 



very distasteful to the rats, who will not bite at any human flesh 
that is anointed with this preparation. These men wear large 
slouch hats, and pursue their calling in all seasons, to make a 
living. Often they have terrible battles with the enraged col- 
onies of rats, and not a few of the ra1>catchers have been over- 



"paddy's goose," ratcliffe highway. 



633 



powered in the sewers when attacked, and their bones whiten 
many of the brick beds and slimy cre"\dces of these dark and 
dismal underground passages. 

The cab driver now desired to know if I would like to visit 
"Paddy's Goose," a den in "Ratcliffe Highway," one of the 
worst of the bad districts of London. This place is frequented 
by sailors of all nations, who visit the spot to dance with the 
abandoned women, that are hired by the proprietors of these 
resorts to entice the foolish seafaring men just discharged from 
their vessels, with more money than they are able to take care of. 

"Paddy's Goose," or the "White Swan," as it is called by 




"paddy's goose. 



its owner, is perhaps the most frightful hell-hole in London. 
The very sublimity of vice and degradation is here attained, 
and the noisy scraping of wheezy fiddles, and the brawls of 
intoxicated sailors are the only sounds heard within its walls. 
It is an ordinary dance house, with a bar and glasses, and a 



63-i 



A TRAMP IN THE BY-WAYS. 



dirty floor on which scores of women of all countries and 
shades of color may be found dancing with Danes, Americans, 
Swedes, Spaniards, Russians, Negroes, Chinese, Malays, Ital- 
ians, and Portuguese, in one wild hell-medley of abomination. 

The proprietor of this den is undoubtedly the most desperate 
villain I ever saw outside of a prison gate, a man whose face 
is scarred and corrugated by the foot-prints of the Devil, 
whose servant he has been for many years, and yet I was in- 
formed that this scoundrel was tolerated, nay, encouraged by 
the government, from the fact that he had great influence 
among English seamen. This man during the Crimean War 
hired steamers, with bands of music, and served the Admiralty 
as a " crimp" for enlisting sailors, or rather for trapping them by 
drugging them first and then "burking" them off to the men- 
of-war, which needed fresh complements of seamen. 

I did not stay long in this Devirs-Tavern, and I am sure my 
readers will excuse me from going into i)articular mention of 
the beastliness and orgies I saw there. 

Dismissing "Old Smudge" with a fee that seemed to meet 
,...„,.,^^_^.^ .-, __,__, , _„ _ -,...ji3Baaasa^^ -<^-^j^^^ 1 h'ls ajiproba- 



f 



ion, I turn- 
ed my steps 
in the direc- 
tion of the 
i V e r , not 
doubting for 
a moment 
but that I 
should find 
further food 
for reflec- 
tion. I came 

upon the Thames suddenly as a vision, and saw it stretching out 
in all its dark and terrible beauty, just above Sliadwell. I had 
taken my seat on an old dismasted hulk that lay some dis- 
tance off in the river, and which I had reached witli considera- 
ble difficulty by clambering from bowsprit to bowsprit among 




WAITING FOR THE TIDE. 



WAITING FOR THE TIDE. 



635 



the silent shipping, on whose masts and canvas God's silent 
stars shone brightly down. 

I had not been sitting long there when a clumsy-looking and 
broad-bottomed boat passed me, directly below the hulk, one 
man pulling in the boat while another leaned over and seemed 
to support something, dark and bulky in shape, from the stern 
of the wherry. 

A chill came over me, and in a faint voice I asked the man 
what he had in the skiff? 

" Oh, yer honor, we were Waiting for the Tide below Bridge. 
We goes out every night, me and Tim, to look for bodies — we 
gets twenty shillings a-piece for them, and all we can find, and 
Tim's got a dead 'un now, and 'praps he's got a good haul, 
for there's a sparkling ring on Its finger, — mayhap yer honor 
would like to buy it." 

Trailing slowly in the water was a lifeless corpse, and the 
boatman was tearing a bright object from its stiff forefinger. 

Hastily I rose and turned my face away from the River 
which had given up its dead in this startling manner. 

I went home thoroughly cured of the blues, and saw no more 
" sights " that night. 







39 




CHAPTER XLVI. 

ENGLISH LITERATURE AND JOURNALISM. 

^NGLISH literature is one of the mainstays 
of onr present civilization. Wlierever the 
English language is spoken or understood, 
or wherever English thought predominates, 
English hooks are read, and the names of 
English authors are lield in reverence. And 
second only to the power of English hooks is the power of the 
English press, which immediately after French journalism, 
represents the most trained culture and best tjalent employed 
in the Fourth Estate of our times. 

London ranks, as I have said, in the second place, as far as 
her journalism is concerned. London journalists have not yet 
attained that high influence, both social and political, in the 
State, which is freely yielded to young and middle-aged men 
whose services are known to be of value on the Parisian jour- 
nals of ability and circulation. 

But the men who think for England, and who write its books, 
do not need to fear comparison with the same class in any 
other land in breadth of thought or influence on the masses of 
mankind. I shall make but a brief mention of a few of Eng- 
land's worthies in the paths of literature, and shall only speak 
of those who are best known by their works in America. 

Twenty-eight years ago, articles of wonderful force, beauty, 
and breadth of tone, began to appear from some unknown pen, 
in the literary journals of London. These articles attracted 
notice from the best minds as they advocated a new and start- 



buskin's love of the beautiful. 



637 



ling theory in art — the theory of Pre-Raphaelitism, as it has 
since been called. The author of these articles was John Rus- 
kin — since become so 
famous — then in his twen- 
ty-fourth year. Ruskin 
was the son of a wealthy 
London merchant, and, 
unlike most men of ge- 
nius he has never known 
any of the bitter strug- 
gles of poverty. From 
his boyhood he has been 
accustomed to elegance 
and plenty, the society 
of refined men and wo- 
men, and his mind has 
been enlarged by almost 
incessant and instructive 
travel. He was very fond 
of the true and beautiful 
in Nature, and it is re- 
corded of him, that when a child he had one favorite spot — 
Friar's Crag, in Derwentwatcr, which overhung a lake, — and 
here he was brought daily by his fond nurse, wlio secretly grati- 
fied the child's taste for the picturesque by allowing him to 
hang over the brow of the cliff, and Avhcn permitted to do so 
he would gaze for hours with intense joy and mingled awe into 
tlie depths of the dark waters below, hanging on by the grassy 
roots which bloomed on the surface of the cliff. He had always 
a feeling of awe and heart hunger in the presence of moun- 
tains, and, at fifteen years of age, he had ascended the sum- 
mits of the most elevated hills in England. A landscape de- 
lighted him, while belle lettres and mathematics only wearied 
his retrospective soul. At twenty, his reflective and practical 
powers had increased by the incessant traveling which he un- 
dertook, having visited every European city of note, but in all 
these travels Venice always remained dear to his heart. At Ox 




JOHN ilUSKIN — ART CRITIC. 



638 ENGLISH LITERATURE AND JOURNALISM. 

ford he was a gentleman-commoner of Christ Church, where he 
carried off the Newdigate prize for a poem called " Salsette and 
Elephanta," a fragment now forgotten, and was graduated double 
fourth class in 1842. Among his teachers in landscape paint- 
ing, which he loved with all his great heart, he had such men 
as Copely Fielding, Harding and Prout. His great admiration 
was for Turner, however, and this love led him to the field of 
art criticism, in defence of that eminent painter. 

In 1848, the first volume of Ruskin's "Modern Painters" 
appeared, and created the greatest sensation. No art critic 
had yet appeared with such a wealth of language, and such an 
affluence of imaginative ideas comljined with the most striking 
powers of observation, and an earnestness bordering on enthu- 
siasm. Never thinking beforehand of the subject, his philoso- 
phy and criticism consists mostly of brilliant invective, and he 
is continually involving himself by his inconsistencies, yet, so 
great was his power, a new school in art was founded by him, 
with such disciples as Millais, Ilolman Hunt, and others, 
equally well known. 

He is sometimes diffuse and discursive, and is far behind 
Henri Taine for perspicuity of style, though far more solid, con- 
centrated, and vigorous, in his blows. Tlic first volumes of 
Ruskin's "Lamps of Architecture" made their appearance in 
1849, and were followed by the first volume of '-The Stones of 
Venice," in 1851, the illustrations in the latter provoking much 
hostility, but displaying to great advantage his artistic powers. 
Ruskin has lectured and written on IManufactures, Gothic Ar- 
chitecture, and Painting, and he has said to have realized, by 
his works the sum of £95,000. He has a careworn face, sloped 
shoulders, and wavy silken hair. His habits are simple, and 
it is said that he is Brahminical in his tastes, never touch- 
ing butcher's meat. His large private fortune enables him to 
extend his benevolence to struggling students, and others who 
are in need of assistance. Ruskin has taken uj) the cause of 
the workingmen of England with great zeal, and is now in his 
forty-ninth year. 

Since the death of Macaulay, England has had no successor 



FROUDE, THE HISTORIAX. 



G39 



to that eminent and great man in the field of history, until of 
late years James Anthony Fronde has risen like a meteor to 
irradiate the dark places and bloody scenes of English history. 
The author of the "His- 
tory of England from the 
Fall of "Wolsey," may 
well claim a niche among 
the loftiest names who 
have searched the arch- 
ives of empire and state- 
craft. James Anthony 
Fronde comes of a High 
Church clerical family, 
and was born at Darting- 
ton, Devonshire, April 
23, 1818. His father, 
the late Venerable R. H. 
Fronde, was Archdeacon 
of Totnes, and young 
Froude went to West- 
minster School, the most 
aristocratic of its kind in 
England, and afterwards was graduated Avith high classical 
honors at Oriel College, Oxford, obtaining the Chancellor's prize 
for an essay on "Political Economy," and was elected Fellow 
of Exeter College in 1842. 

For some time he was connected with the High Church party 
led by the Rev. J. H. Newman, and so much Avas he imbued 
by its doctrines, that he wrote the "Lives of the English 
Saints," and took deacon's orders in 1844. He has also writ- 
ten "The Shadows of the Clouds," 1847, and "The Nemesis of 
Faith," in 1849, both of which works had to undergo the se- 
verest condemnation of the University authorities, for the 
Puseyite opinions broached in their pages. 

In 1850, Froude laid the foundation-stone of his fame by a 
series of articles, chiefly on English History, which were con- 
tributed to the Westminster Review and Frazer's 3Iagazine, and 




JAMES ANTHONY FROLDIC. 



640 ENGLISH LITERATURE AND JOURNALISM. 

in 185G ho published the two first volumes of his " History of 
England." This is his greatest work, in ten volumes, and for 
clearness of thought, powerful intensity, and acute understand- 
ing of those stormy periods of Henry VIH, Elizabeth and ^lary, 
there arc few passages in written history to equal Fronde's de- 
scriptions of the age, and his grand delineations of character. 
He is, however, prejudicial in many things, and his view of the 
characters of Mary, Queen of Scot and Queen Elizabeth, is 
altogether different from the view which all modern historians 
have taken of these two women. 

In 18G7,a work entitled "Short Studies on Great Subjects," 
was published by Mr. Froude, and the historical sketches in 
this volume are of the most masterly kind in English literature. 
Mr. Froude is now Editor of Frazer^s Magazine, wliose pages 
his powerful genius illuminated some twenty years ago. This 
magazine had formerly for its contributors some of the finest 
scholars and best thinkers in Britain. Frazer^s 3Iagazine is 
issued by Longmans, Green & Co., Paternoster Row, one of 
the great publishing houses, and whose business is only 
rivaled by that of John Murray, McMillan, Sampson, Low & 
Son, and Smith & Elder, among London booksellers. 

Among the contributors to Frazcr are Max Muller, F. W. 
Newman, E. Lynn Linton, Jean Ingelow, Sliirlcy Brooks, R. 
A. Proctor, Moncurc D. Conway, a Massachusetts man, and a 
personal and intimate friend of Carlyle, — I believe he is to 
write the biograi)hy of that dogmatic old thinker, who has 
failed to prevent the earth from revolving on its axis, when 
he is gathered to his fathers, in the little churchyard in Dum- 
frieshire. William Howard Russell, James Spcdding, Federick 
Denison Maurice, a liberal clergyman and a professor in Lon- 
don University, and others whom I do not recollect, are con- 
tributors to Frazer. This magazine contains 134 double-column 
pages of large print, on fine white paper, and is sold for two 
shillings and sixj)cnce. The same matter and workmanship 
could not bo sold in America for less than one dollar and 
twenty-five cents, I am informed. ]\riss Ligelow, one of its 
contributors, is by no means a Miss in her teens, being now in 



Swinburne's boyish days. 



641 



her forty-first year, but it is tolerably certain that such delight- 
ful verse as hers could not have been written by one who had not 
endured sorrow and trial. The several editions of her poems 
have realized for Miss Ingelowthe comfortable sum of £8,500, 
and I was told by a leading London bookseller, that Mr. Froude, 
whose last article was on " Salmon Fishing in Ireland," sold 
the copyright on four of his books for .£39,000. Miss Ingelow 
is a Suffolk girl, and rumor says has never married because of 
a blighted affection in early life. 

A worthy successor to Lord Byron, in my opinion, is Alger- 
non Charles Swinburne, 
the most passionate Eng- 
lish poet who has lived 
for one hundred years. 
Swinburne is in his twen- 
ty-eighth year, and at that 
early age he has attained 
for himself a position 
among the poets of his 
native land, surpassed by 
none. For wealth of lan- 
guage, beauteous and fer- 
vent passion, and gorge- 
ousness of imagery, Keats 
alone is his peer. Swin- 
burne is an earnest re- 
publican,and sympathizes 
^vith revolution in every 
land. He is a great ad- 
mirer of Italy. For a poem of one page in an English maga- 
zine he received two hundred and fifty pounds, a larger price 
than was ever paid before in England for a poetical fragment. 

Swinburne, though a republican in sentiment, belongs to one 
of the oldest Roman Catholic families of Northumberland, and 
comes from ancestors who have followed the Percy in plate 
armor against the fierce barons of the House of Douglas. I 
am sorry to say, however, that the poet does not look like a 




ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE — FOET. 



642 ENGLISH LITERATURE AND JOURNALISE!. 

man who -would wear a steel jerkin and hang a battle-axe at 
his saddle bow. He has long curling hair, a pair of wierd fas- 
cinating eyes, a loose and slender frame, and a face which does 
not impress one favorably at first. Take him altogether he 
seems like a man who might like to recline on a bed of roses, 
with an Amphora of Falernian by his couch, and half a dozen Sy- 
rian damsels to wait on him and hand him flowing bumpers 
of golden wine. 

His boyish days were spent at Eton, and here he was noticed 
only for his utter dislike to athletic sports, including the dar- 
ling amusement of every Etonian — I mean the cricket field. 
He was finished at Oxford, but did not receive his degree from 
Alma Mater. From the Universit}' he went to Florence, and 
there he contracted a warm friendship for that great gothic 
and rough-angled character, Walter Savage Landor, wliich was 
ardently reciprocated by the latter. Returning to England in 
1861 he published the " Queen Mother," and " Rosamond," 
neither of which attracted much attention. His first great and 
decided success was in that classic poem "Atalanta in Caly- 
don," published in 1864, when Swinburne had attained his 
twenty-first year. This poem took the cultivated minds of 
England by storm, and was followed by " Chastelard," "Poems 
and Ballads," "Laus Veneris," and a biography of "William 
Blake," the painter, in quick succession. Since then his copy- 
rights have amounted to X 27,000, so rapid has been the sale 
of his books. This moneyed success does not, however, pre- 
vent the poet from being afflicted with a very penurious spirit, 
and it is said that he is in the habit of giving waiters and ser- 
vants sixpences for the pleasure of taking the gifts back. 

The greatest publicist in England, at this juncture, and the 
man whose views demand most attention from press and peo- 
ple, after Carlyle, is John Stuart Mill, the eminent writer on 
Political Economy, who was formerly a clerk in the India 
House, like Charles Lamb, as his father had been before 
him. Mr. Mill is now sixty-six years of age, and has lately 
taken up the cudgel for the Woman's Suffrage party, in Eng- 
land, along with Miss Harriet Martineau, after having exhaust- 



JOHN STUART MILL. 



643 



ed Utilitarianism, Political Economy, Parliamentary Reform, 
Logical Systems, Auguste Comte, Positivism, Philosophy, and 
other light and airy sub- 
jects. Yet all his great 
powers of thought did not 
prevent him from being 
badly beaten by a Mr. 
Smith, a news agent, for 
the representation of the 
Borough of Westminsterj 
in the late parliamentary 
elections. Mr. Mill has 
a grand broad forehead, 
a pair of deep steadfast 
eyes, a firm mouth, and 
is of studious habits. 
Like all students his ora- 
tory in Parliament, when 
first elected, was more 
ornate and logical than 
impressive or forcible. 
His English is vigorous and sterling, and it must be said of 
this venerable old man, that his whole life has been devoted to 
an idea. 

The very opposite of John Stuart Mill is Benjamin F. Dis- 
raeli, who Avas born in Bradenham, Buckinghamshire, Dec. 21, 
1805. It is more than positive that Mr. Disraeli has never 
sacrificed any thing for an idea. Mr. Isaac Disraeli, his father, 
was a Christian, and an author, who had written the " Curi- 
osities of Literature," and the "Amenities of Literature," the 
latter being a book in which the misfortunes and failings of 
authors occupy a large space. The grandfather of the great 
politician was a Jew of the Jews, I believe, and he wlio is now 
leader of the Conservative party in the House of Commons, 
and who was Lord Chancellor of England, has ever had a deep 
feeling for and faith in Judaism, although he has been for many 
years the Champion of the Anglican Church. At twenty years 




JOHN STUART MILL — POLITICAL ECONOMIST. 



644 



ENGLISH LITERATURE AND JOURNALISM. 



of age, Disraeli, wlio was then as fond of velvet shooting jackets 
and jewelry as he is now in his old age, or as Dickens was in 

his prime, began to write 
novels, and from 1825 to 
1831 he had written 
"Vivian Grey," "The 
Young Duke," "Hen- 
rietta Temple," "Conta- 
rini Fleming," "Vene- 
tia," "Alroy," and "Con- 
ingsby." 

In 1837, he entered 
Parliament, and made a 
miserable failure as a 
speaker and was laughed 
down, but he was not of 
the stuff to be frightened. 
Since then he has filled 
the greatest offices of 
trust that it is possible 
for a commoner to fill in 
England, and at times a radical revolutionist, and then again a 
most stauncli monarchist, he has had greatness of soul enough 
to refuse a title offered him by the Queen, Aviien he retired 
from the Cabinet in which he was Prime Minister, The honor 
tendered him was politely refused with many thanks, but he 
accepted the title of Viscountess Bcaconsfield for his noble 
and devoted wife, who enriched and has sustained him in all 
his severest struggles. 

It is told of this brave lady, that while accompanying her 
husband in a carriage to the House one night, Disraeli be- 
came lost in thought about a great speech which he was going 
to make, and the carriage door having closed on one of her 
fingers, she never uttered a sound of i)ain until the cquippage 
drove into the Palace yard at Westminster, when the footman 
jumped down, and she fainted in her husband's arms. One 
hundred and fifty thousand copies of Disraeli's "Lothair" have 




BENJAMIN DISKAELI — POLITICIAN. 



CHARLES KINGSLEY. 



645 



been sold, and it is more tlian probable that the sale "will not 
stop short of 250,000 copies. The bitterest article in review 
of this book was written in Blackwood' s J/a^a^me, by Lawrence 
Oliphant, author of the "Piccadilly Papers by a Peripatetic," 
in London Society. Mr. Oliphant deserted fashionable London 
society to found a Communistic association on the shores of 
Lake Erie, and having accumulated a secretion of gall and 
wormwood there he went back to England and poured it out 
on the head of Disraeli. 

The Rev. Charles Kingsley, formerly rector of Eversley and 
Chaplain in Ordinary to the Queen, and now Dean of Roches- 
ter, is tlie defender of Muscular Christianity in English litera- 
ture. He is the son of a clergyman, and is descended from 
the ancient Saxon family of the Kingsleys, of Kingsley, in the 
Forest of Delamere. He was educated at Kings College, Lon- 
don, and Magdalen Col- 
lege, Cambridge, and is 
nearly fifty years of age. 
From his advocacy of the 
cause of the workingmen 
he has been called the 
"Chartist Parson." His 
chief works are, "Hypa- 
tia, or New Foes with Old 
Faces," "Alexandria and 
Her Schools," "West- 
ward, Ho," "Two Years 
ago," and "Hereward, 
Last of the Saxons." He 
delivered the " Roman 
and Teuton Lectures " 
while professor of Mod- 
ern History at Cambridge 
University. He has also 

written a scries of children's books on historical subjects, which 
are very popular in England. His brother, Henry Kingsley, 
a novelist of considerable reputatior*., is eleven years younger, 




CHARLES KINGSLEY — NOVELIST. 



646 ENGLISH LITERATURE AND JOURNALISM. 

and is a contributor to the Gentleman's Magazine, the oldest 
periodical of its kind in England, which is sold for one shilling. 

Anthony Trollopc, the most voluminous English novelist now 
living, was born in 1815, and comes of a literary family, his 
mother having made a certain sort of fame by her book of 
American travels which did not redound to her credit. j\Iany 
years after the issue of Mrs. Trollope's book, her son visited 
America and sought to redeem the unfavorable impression 
made by his parent's villification of our people, in his " North 
America," published in 1861. Anthony Trollopc was educated 
at Winchester and Harrow, and at thirty-two years of age wrote 
his first novel, "The McDermotts of Ballycloran," a picture 
of Irish middle class life. Since then lie has furnished to the 
publishers of his works enough material to fill a small library. 
Many of his genial novels appeared in the Cornhill Magazine, 
whicli was edited by Thackeray at one time, and subsequently 
by Frederick Greenwood, wlio was, during the former's man- 
agement, a proof reader on the Cornhill, and is now the editor 
of the Pall Mall Gazette, the establishment of which journal 
was the realization of the dream of Thackeray's life. 

James Greenwood, the "Amateur Casual," a brother of Fred- 
erick Greenwood, has written a number of books of adventure 
of the most stirring kind, and was attached to the London 
Morning Star, a penny morning paper, which advocated the 
cause of the North during the Civil "War, and local sketches 
every alternate day were furnished by him to its columns, for 
which he received sixteen guineas a weelv. 

Mr, John Morley, whom I have to thank for much courtesy, 
was editor of the Star during my sojourn in Loudon. He is 
now editor of the Fortnicfhtly Revieiv, Avith whicli he was for- 
merly connected. The Star suspended publication about six 
months ago. I believe John Bright held a stockholding inter- 
est in the Star previous to its suspension, and had, on some 
occasions, directed its editorial opinions. 

Mr. Trollope has an eminently literary look, and Avears huge 
large sliaggy whiskers, and a pair of spectacles. His pictures 
of Irish middle class society and English clerical characters, 



THE MAGAZINES. 



647 



are the best and 'truest ever drawn by an British novelist, his 
Irish characters being infinitely superior to those of Charles 
Lever, whose heroes swagger and strut in a most atrocious 
manner. Anthony TroUope has a brother, Thomas Adolphus 
TroUope, who is also a literary man of considerable note, and 
is five years the junior of Anthony. Adolphus Ti'ollopc resides 
chiefly in Florence, and has written several works of fiction 
connected with the very romantic history of that city. The 
younger TroUope has been twice married. His first wife was 
an authoress, named Miss Garrow, Avho died in 1865, and 
eight months after her decease he was again married to a Miss 
Ternan, who is now living. That was what an unprejudiced 
mind might call quick work for a novelist. Anthony TroUope 
is the editor, and also, I believe, the proprietor of >S'^. PaiiVs 
Magazine, which is sold for one shilling a number. 

The circulation of the numerous London magazines and 
periodicals is only to be 
computed by millions. 
Of course the cheap mag- 
azines have the largest 
circulation, and the cheap- 
est are not by any means 
the worst edited. The 
Temple Bar magazine, 
which was established by 
George Augustus Sala, 
a well known correspond- 
ent of the 3Iorning Tele- 
graph, sells for a shilling, ^^ 
and has among its con- 
tributors Mrs. Edwards, 
Florence Maryatt, Miss 
Harriet Martincau, who 
is also a contributor to 
the Dailg News, H. Su- 
therland Edwards, John Holingshead, who was formerly the 
dramatic critic of the Daihj News, and is now manager of a 




ANTHONY TROLLOPE — NOVELIST. 



648 ENGLISH LITERATURE AND JOURNALISM. 

London Theatre. The Brittania Magazine is well edited and 
lias original stories and sketches, and sells for sixpence. Bow 
Bells Magazine is a good local periodical, selling for eightpence, 
and Belgravia, edited by Miss Braddon, sells for one shilling, 
as does the St. James, which is well known for its clever 
Parliamentary sketches. Cyrus Redding, the famous octoge- 
narian writer on wine culture, was for many years a constant 
contributor to Colburn''s Monthly, in which many of William 
Harrison Ainsworth's sensation serial stories have appeared. 
Louisa Stuart Costello and her brother Dudley Costello, and 
Mrs. Ward, for many years contributed to the pages of Col- 
burn's Montfdy. Blackwood's Magazine is too well known to 
need any enumeration of its famous writers. Blachicood' s sells 
at two-and-sixpence the number. 

3IcMillan''s Magazine is issued at one shilling a numl^er by 
the publishing house of McMillan &, Co., Bedford street, Covent 
Garden, having 78 double column pages of matter. Among 
its contributors are Frederick W. H. Myers, Edward Nolan, S. 
Greg, Thomas A. Lindsay, Dr. Boycc, Edward A. Freeman, 
Charles Kingsley, Jean Ingelow, Menella Bute Smedley, Mrs. 
Brotherton, F. Xapier Broome, Thomas Hughes, Godfrey Tur- 
ner, T. W. Robinson, and F. W. Newman. Cornhill is publish- 
ed by Smith, Elder &, Co. All the Year Round is edited by Chas. 
Dickens, Jr., who is rated very high as a sketch writer, and is 
also well known as a rowing and yachting man. The London 
Society Magazine is pulilishcd at 217 Piccadilly, and the most 
aristocratic of all the London magazines, being beautifully 
illustrated, and having excellent social, club, and fashionable 
sketches. The London Society is sold for a shilling, and has a 
number of lady artists who make drawings for its pages. Wat- 
son, W. Brunton, Lionel Henley, Adelaide Claxton, H. Tuck, 
A. Tliompson, and F. Walker, are among the best known artr 
ists on this magazine. Walter Thornbury, author of " Haunt- 
ed London," Lawrence Oliphant, Edmund Yates, and Las- 
celles Wraxall, are contributors to the London Society. The 
" Graphic,^^ the finest illustrated weekly ever published in 
London, is edited by Arthur Lockyer, who has succeeded its 



THE LONDON TIMES. 



649 



former editor — H. Sutherland Edwards. The circulation of 
the different magazines is computed as follows : 

Cornhill, 36,000; dlcMlUan, 28,000; Blackwood, 39,000; 
London Sociehj, 2^,000; Frazer,!!, 000; Colburn's 3IonthJy, 
7,500; Temple Bar, 1^,000; St. PauVs, 1^,000; Gentleman's 
Magazine, 25,000; Britannia Magazine^ 26,000; *S'^. James\ 
15,000, and Belgravia, 16,000. 




DELIVERING THE "TIMES 



The circulation of the principal critical Weeklies is ; Satur- 
day Revieiv, sixpence, 38,000 ; Spectator, sixpence, 22,000 ; 
Athenceum, sixpence, 29,600 ; Examiner and London RevieiUy 
13,000. The Saturday Revieiv has forty pages of double- 
column matter, large print, twelve of which are devoted to ad- 
vertisements, the remaining pages being taken up with edito- 
rials, book reviews, notices of the drama and fine arts. The 
Athenaeum has twenty-two quarto pages of three columns each, 
ten of which are taken up by advertisements, and the remain- 
der by book reviews, and dramatic, fine art, and scientific notes. 
The editor of this journal is Sir Charles Wentworth Pilke, 
M. P., who wrote an excellent book of travel, entitled " Greater 
Britain." Ruskin and Huxley have been contributors to the 



650 ENGLISH LITERATURE AND JOURNALISM. 

Athenmum. The Spectator lias twenty-eight pages folio, and is 
chiefly noticeable for its valuable historical studies, and its 
short and spicy paragraphs on the first four pages of the paper. 
Any of these "sveeklies will be sent abroad for the additional 
cost of a penny stamp. 

The first number of the London Times "was printed January 
1, 1788, by John Walter, and the first newspaper printed by 
steam in Europe was the Times of November 20, 1814. Ap- 
plegarth and Cowper's four cylindered presses, printing five to 
eight thousand sheets an hour, were in use by the Times for 
many years. These were succeeded by Hoe's press- with 
"Whithworth's improvement, and now the Bullock press modi- 
fied, which prints on an endless sheet, is used by the Times. 
The circulation of this, the leading journal of Europe, varies 
from 57,000 to 65,000 copies a day, and the owner is Mr. 
Walter, the son of its founder. John Thaddeus Delane, the 
son of William F. A. Delane, the former financial manager, 
who has been succeeded by Mowbray Morris, is the editor of the 
Times. He is an Oxford man, and was admitted to the bar in 
1847. Since 1839 he has been connected with the Times, to 
whose editorship he succeeded in 1841, on the decease of its 
then famous editor, Mr. Thomas Barnes. The value of the 
Times newspaper property has been estimated at three million 
pounds, or fifteen million dollars. As Thackeray said, its am- 
bassadors are everywhere ; one may be seen pricing potatoes at 
Covent Garden, while another is committing to paper the Cabi- 
net intrigues at Berlin. Among its most celebrated writers have 
been Barnes, Sterling, Horace Twiss, William Howard Russell, 
Thackeray, Thomas Noon Talfourd, Baron Alderson, Louis J. 
Jennings, the American correspondent, now editor of the New 
York Times, and others. Southey was offered the editorial 
management at a salary of X 2,000 a year, and the same offer 
was made to Thomas Moore, the poet, Ijut both declined ac- 
ceptance. The Times, with supplement, has seventy-two col- 
umns of matter, on sixteen pages, and 2,250 advertisements 
have been inserted in one day's issue, seven tons of paper, 
with a surface of thirty acres, and seven tons of type, being used. 



f 



CIRCULATION OF JOURNALS. 



651 



The circulation and prices of the leading London journals, 
areas follows: Times., 65,000, four pence; Daily JVeivs, 4S,- 
000, one penny ; DaiiT/ Teleg^rajjh, 175,000, one penny ; Morn- 
ing and Evening Standard, 80,000, one penny ; Morning Ad- 
vertiser (rumseller's organ), 35,000, one penny; Pall Mall 
Gazette (evening), 30,000, one penny; Echo (evening), 
75,000, one penny; Globe (evening), 8,000, one penny ; Punch 
(weekly), 55,000, six pence ; Illustrated London News, 60,000, 
four pence ; Graphic, 80,000, six pence ; BeWs Life (sporting), 
Wednesday and Saturday, 66,000, one penny; The Field (sport- 
ing, weekly), 18,000, six pence; Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper 




SUB-EDITOR S ROOM, TELEGRAPH OFFICE 



(Sunday), 140,000, one penny: Weekly Times (Sunday) — 
owned by London Journal, which has a circulation of 200,000 — 
110,000, one jienny ; CasselVs Weekly Magazine, 90,000, 
Weekly Dispatch (Sunday), 215,000, two pence.; Reynold's 
Neivspaper . (^nw^nY^ •) 280,000, one penny; Jewish Record 
(weekly), one penny, 7,500 ; Tablet (Catholic weekly), four 



pence, 36,000. 



40 



^«^v^- 



652 ENGLISH LITERATUIIE AND JOURNALISM. 

The Morning Telegraph is the most popular daily newspaper 
in the world. During periods of great excitement its circulation 
increases to over 200,000 copies a day, and it takes four ten- 
cylinder, and four six-cylinder Hoe's presses, to strike off its 
daily editions. The correspondent of the Telegraph at Paris, 
Mr. Whitelmrst, is hand and glove with Napoleon, and his sal- 
ary amounts to £10,000, with a horse and brougham thrown 
in. The editor of the Telegraph is Thornton Hunt, son of 
Leigh Hunt, who was for twenty years on the staff of the Spec- 
tator. The sub-editor of the Telegraph, for they have no man- 
aging editors in England, is Mr. Ralph Harrison, to whom I am 
much indebted for courtesies received. The owner of the Tele- 
graph is a Hebrew gentleman named Levy. The Dailg 'JVews 
is owned by the Liberation Society, a Dissenters' association, 
and is edited I believe, by ]\Ir. Edward Dicey, formerly a spe- 
cial correspondent of the Telegraph, ^^\\o 'went to Suez for that 
journal. Tom Hood, son of the poet, was editor of the Toma- 
hawk formerly, and lately of the Latest News, a penny Satur- 
day paper, and Arthur A Beckct has edited Fun. James 
Grant is now editor of the 3Iorning Advertiser, at a salary of 
fifty pounds a week, and Blanchard Jerrold receives £800 a 
year for editing Lloyds' Weekhj. The salaries of editors on the 
London press vary from fifteen to fifty pounds a week, accord- 
ing to the ability displayed, and the circumstances of the 
journal on which they are employed. 




"^ 



mi^ 




CHAPTER XLVII. 

THE POOR OF LONDON. 

EYOND comparison London exceeds all 
other cities of Europe for the number of 
its poor, and the misery and suffering of 
those who individually make up the gross 
totals in workhouses, back slums, and 
miasmatic tenements. 

One of the most interesting — if not the 
most curious and cheerful scenes in the metropolis — may be 
witnessed any day by a visit to the East London " Half-Penny 
Soup House," an institution established by good and merciful 
people, whereby the poor little castaways and waifs of the city 
are provided with a dish of soup, a piece of meat, and a small 
loaf of bread, once in each twenty-four hours. 

The children are gathered from the promiscuous juvenile 
assemblages that may be, at any time, found in the London 
streets, and are taken to the Soup House where large and 
steaming dishes of soup are given them, by charitable ladies, 
after which they are dismissed until the next twenty-four 
hours have elapsed, when again they assemble to partake of 
the same plentiful and grateful food. This nourishment costs 
but a half-penny per head, all the attendance and time being 
given gratuitously by the good ladies who seek the little ones 
for their own merciful purpose. 

The struggles of the London poor to keep soul and body to- 
gether, are very Avonderfnl to understand or relate. Out of 
every live poor families in London — it is known that at least 
three are compelled, between Easter and Christmas, to denude 



656 



THE POOR OF LONDON. 



tlieir households of all the most necessary articles of clothing 
and furniture, to take them to the pawnbroker's shops in order 
that bread and meat may be procured for their little ones. 
And what terrible scenes are witnessed in these pawnbroker's 
shops, on Saturday nights when the goods are reclaimed by 
dint of economy and hard scraping? None but God, the police, 
and the pawnbroker, ever sec such struggles. 




A PAWNBROKER S SHOP. 



One day I paid a visit to the Workhouse of St. Martin's, in 
the Fields, which is not far distant from Trafalgar square. 
This workhouse looks like a vast prison, stern, gloomy, and 
frowning, in the very busiest quarter of the city. Opposite to 
its entrance was the barracks of some regiment of infantry, 
and round the doors, were talking and smoking, half-a-dozen of 
long-legged and slim-waisted private soldiers, in red shell jack- 
ets, whose chief occupation seemed to be that of switching 



THE MASTER OF THE WORKHOUSE. 657 

their manly calves with slender rods which they jauntily carried 
hi their hands. 

The workhouse door was shown to me hy a squad of small 
boys who were at play in the adjoining gutters, clad in a pau- 
per's uniform of blue, and on whose heads were dirty but com- 
fortable caps of plaid pilot cloth. 

" Yes, master, there is the Workus, over yander. "Will ye 
give us a penny ? We are all Workus," said they in chorus. 

I entered the low entrance and stood in a small vestibule, 
where stood a shelf, or stand, upon which was placed an open 
blank or visitors' book, in which each caller was to inscribe 
his name and residence, together with his object for visiting 
the workhouse. On the opposite page were blank spaces, on 
which an attendant entered the hours when a visitor called and 
when he left the institution. 

A miserable, worm-eaten looking old man, devoid of teeth, 
and shambling in his gait, a perfect wreck, shuffled up to me 
with a deprecating look in his eye, as if he were asking pardon 
for being alive. Heavens ! how the iron of poverty, and the 
bitterness of dependence, must have eaten away that poor 
wretch's soul before such enduring lines of degradation could 
have been impressed on his features. 

This old pauper was detailed to wait upon the visitors, and to 
see that their names were inscribed, with the warning that he 
should not attempt to ask for or receive any gratuity. 

He faintly said in a childish voice : 

" What can I do for jou. Sir ? Do you wish to see the 
Workus ? Ah, yes, of course, a goodish bit of people comes to 
see the poor paupers, now and then, but we are never allowed to 
take anything, Sir. No never, never. Poor paupers, poor pau- 
pers," and so he mumbled away until the Master of the work- 
house was announced by his footsteps that came in echoes as I 
sat in the little, poverty-stricken ante-room. 

To the Master, who is the supreme authority in the work- 
house, under the direction of the Board of Guardians of the 
parish, I explained my motives for visiting the paupers' resi- 
dence, and he welcomed me with much politeness, offering me 



658 THE POOR OF LONDON. 

every facility to inspect the place. He was a medium sized 
man, of middle age, plainly dressed, and after having issued 
orders to several of the inmates of the establishment he jn-epared 
to accompany me through the premises. Here and there, in 
the walks and corridors, and courts of the workhouse, we met 
with an occasional pauper, the males in a grey, rough, shoddy 
uniform, and the women in check or plaid gowns, of a coarse 
cotton material, and wearing caps of a faded whiteness upon 
their heads. 

They all had a vacant, listless look, and seemed lost in as- 
tonishment to see a stranger with the Master, to whom they 
made the most servile of salutations. 

I had seen, in my travels on the English railways, when I 
sought the not very wholesome refuge of the third class car- 
riages to study character — just such poor, faded-looking peo- 
ple, among the families journeying wearily to their various 
destinations, as these poor old relics, who were now clustering 
around the workhouse tea tables. Oh, God ! how lonely they 
looked, and distant from all human kind. The same wan, 
woe-begone faces, but more quiet and reserved than those I 
saw in the close railway cars devoted to poor people. 

Smoking is a common thing in these crowded and close car- 
riages, and delicate women, and puny, weak children, are 
forced to travel for hundreds of miles in these cattle boxes — I 
cannot call them aught else — until they are sometimes known 
to vomit from the bad air and worse stenches. 

Making inquiries of this gentleman as I went through the 
buildings, I may as well give his explanations of workhouse 
life, and of the condition of the poor and destitute of London. 
I freely admitted to him that I had heard very strange stories 
in regard to the treatment, food, and medical attendance of 
the paupers in the Unions, and that I would be obliged to him 
if he could clear up my reasonable doubts on many points. 

In answer to one of these doubts the Master took me into a 
large, long and clean-looking room, in which were about forty 
female paupers. These women were engaged in getting sup- 



1 



SUGAR AND TEA. 



659 



per for themselves, and were all above middle ago, and hag- 
gard-looking. 

"Now, Sir," said he to me, "you, of course, can sec some- 
thing of which you speak, for yourself. Ilere is one of tlic busy 
wards of the Union. Each of these old women is allowed an 




A THIRD CLA&b RAIL\\ AT CARRIAGE 



ounce of dry tea per day, and enough sugar to moderately 
sweeten four cups of tea, which they make in their own tea- 
caddies, or, sometimes they mess together — three or four in a 
mess — and those who do not care for sugar will trade their sur- 
plus sugar for the surplus dry tea with some other paupers." 

All the women arose from their low seats or benches, some 
of them being clustered around a grate in which were a moder- 
ate stock of burning coals, and bowed to tlie ^Master, wlio waved 
his hand and told them to sit down again, whicli they did with 
courtesies and many feeble expressions of thanks. 



660 THE POOR OP LONDON. 

" That old woman over there in the corner," said the Master, 
pointing to a female of sixty years of age, who sat alone rub- 
l)ing her bare arms, and chatting to herself senselessly, " has lost 
her wits. She is here forty-five years, and will die here in all 
probability. We have about 400 in-door paupers in this work- 
house, and perhaps twice as many out-door poor, whom the 
parochial authorities assist as well as they can. Every pauper 
whom we support in this house costs the rate-payers of this 
parish about seventeen pounds six and tenpence per head, which 
does not include charge for rent, taking the interest of the value 
of the property. For the children we have a school, and they 
get the rudiments and that's all. It is an idea with some, and 
1 am afraid, with many poor people, " once a pauper always a 
pauper." The children who are born in this place, would never 
become independent of the parish if it were not that as soon 
as they grow up we send them to schools of an industrial kind 
outside of London, where they learn a trade, or are taught 
some occupation, such as gardening, blacksmithing, carpenter- 
ing, or, in fact, anything tliat will enable them to make a liv- 
ing. The feeding and schooling of the children, with the 
nursing, &c., costs more per head for them, strange to say, 
than it does for a grown person's subsistence and clothing in 
London. 

" In this parish alone we have to take care of 478 children, 
and in some of the London parishes in Bethnal Green, and 
Hackney, or Stepney, they sometimes have to provide for from 
1,500 to 2,000 children, of both sexes. Of course, in the very 
large parishes they cannot afford to educate the children, but have 
to content themselves with feeding and clothing as many as they 
can inside the workhouse, while the majority receive, with 
their parents, out-door relief, but the large and heavy parishes 
could not afford to have such fine schools as we have in the 
suburbs, with grounds attached, and sometimes goodish pieces 
of land, where farming and gardening can be taught the chil- 
dren. It costs the rate-payers of this parish twenty pounds a 
year to support and educate the parish children, and, along 
with all the rest of the taxes, it is no wonder that the people 



WORKHOUSE RATIONS. 661 

arc grumbling and asking why wc do not send the beggars to 
America or Australia." 

"And why do you not?" said I to him, "if the sustenance 
of a pauper, together with his clothing, costs the parish X21 
annually." 

"Because, the people of London have an idea somehow or 
other, that the Americans will not receive paupers, and then 
again, if .£21 was given to a pauper to go to America, they 
would raise a row in Parliament that too much money was 
going out of the country. Why," said he, "down at Birken- 
liead, near Liverpool, schools were built for paupers at a cost 
of <£ 15,000, with bath-rooms and fine dining-rooms, and the 
people there raised an awful row because the cost to the rate- 
payers came to ten shillings per head per annum to every inhabi- 
tant in the place. They did n't want to give them bath-rooms or 
fine dining-rooms. They turned a man away there who was frozen, 
and he had to lose all of his toes on account of their neglect. 
In some of the workhouses, in the North of England, they are 
beginning to let the children out to board by the week, with 
farmers and families who can afford to take them, the parish 
authorities allowing, for each child, three shillings per week 
for board, with an outfit on leaving the workhouse, and six 
shillings and sixpence a quarter for mending and repairing 
their clothes, an offer which has been very cheerfully accepted 
by many families who are in decent circumstances." 

"A ' Casual,' " said the Master, " is a pauper who is house- 
less and destitute in a different parish from which he has lived. 
When he finds himself in a strange place, as in London, he 
has to apply at the Police Station for a ticket, which is given 
him as a reference to ask for one night's lodging at the work- 
house in the district. The ticket is shown to the Master, who 
receives him, and I will send him down here, but Ijcfore he is 
sent down he gets a loaf of bread, weighing a pound and a 
quarter. He must apply to tlie House for lodgings before ten 
o'clock at night, or we will not let him in. Then he takes the 
loaf of bread and eats half of it for his supper, and the other 



662 



THE POOR OP LONDON. 



half he saves for his breakfast. We give him, with the remain- 
ing half loaf of bread in the morning, a half pint of coffee or 
tea. But before he goes he has got to earn the breakfast which 
we give him, and is compelled to pick oakum from six o'clock 
in the morning until nine, when he leaves the House." 

Before I left the workhouse the Master allowed me to inspect 
the beef, bread, butter, and beer, which are served out daily to 
the paupers. Each grown man and woman receives a twelve 
ounce loaf of bread, a pint of the best beer, an ounce of butter, 
daily, and five days in the week they receive six ounces of fresh 
meat, the other days being especially devoted to beans, and 
a liquid compound known to seafaring men as " skillagelee." 



v^^*^^-^ 





rami .i havp..vf,l bx- .loKnTl'X'tti'onton'^ 



BELKInTAP & BLISS, 

OF 

HARTFORD, CONN., 

^re engaged, in. tlie Publication of 

YALUABLE STANDARD WORKS, 

SOLD ONLY BY SUBSCRIPTION, 



Old Agents, and all others who want the Best and most Popular 
Books, and the Best Paying Agencies, will please send for their Cir- 
culars, which are sent free, and give full particulars. 



THE EXPOSE: 

OR, 

MORMOI^S AI^D MORMO^ISM. 

Giving its Rise, Progress, and Present Condition, 
"witli the Narration of 

Mrs. MAEY ETTIE Y. SMITH, 

a Sister of one of the Iligh Priests — of her residence and experience for 
Fifteen Years among them, with a full, graphic, and authentic account of 
their Social Condition, their Religious Doctrines, and I'olitical Govern- 
ment. It is a full and truthful disclosure of the Rites, Ceremonies, and 
Mysteries of Polygamy, with facts and statements truly startling; and 
also contains the speech recently delivered before the Elders in Utah, 
by Vice-President Colfax, and the reply of John Taylor. 

It is an Illustrated 12mo Volume, and sold only by subscription at the 
following prices : • 

Bound in Fine Cloth, $2.00 

" " Leather, Library Style, . . . 2.30 

" " extra Half Morocco, . . . 3.00 

Agents Wanted. Apply to 

BELKNAP & BLISS, 

HAIiTFORU. CONN. 



PICTORIAL 



tstwrii 0f i\t ^mid mnk§. 



ONE ROYAL OCTAVO VOLUME OP ABOUT EIGHT HUNDRED PAGES, 

AND CONTAINING 

Four Hundred Engravings on Wood, besides Twelve 
Full Page Steel Engravings. 

By BElsrSOI^ J. LOSSIiN'G. 



In this single volume may be found a record of every important event, 
from the discovery of the country to the present time, including short 
biographical sketches of all the distinguished men who have figured in its 
history. Every family should possess it. Prices as follows : 

In 3Enil>ossecl <Jlotli, _ - - - _ S5.00 

In 3-ieatlier, I-iilirary Style, - - - - S.50 

In Half Turkey 3Iox'occo, - - - - O.OO 



LIVES OF CELEBRATED AMERICANS. 

COMPKISIXG 

Bio^raiililes of Tliree Hnndrel anJ Forty Eminent Persons 



AND 

ILLUSTRATED WITH OVER ONE HUXDRED FIXE PORTRAITS. 

By BENSON J. LOSSING. 

Sold only by subscription, at the following prices : 

In Cloth Hincling, --___- 03.50 

In ILieatlxer, Lil)rary Style, ----- 3.00 

AGENTS WANTED. Apply to 

BELKNAP & BLISS, 

HARTFORD, CONN. 



LOSSING'S PICTORIAL HISTORY 

OF 

THE GEEAT CIYIl WAR. 

Ttiree Imperial Octsivo "Volumes, 

OF OVER 600 PAGES EACH, EMBELLISHED BY 

MORE THAN 1,200 ENGRAVINGS ON WOOD, and 100 PORTRAITS OF UNION 
GENERALS, ENGRAVED ON STEEL. 

By BENSOI^ J. LOSSIJN'G, 

Author of "Field Book of the Revolution," "Eminent Americans," "History of the 
United States," etc. 



Tlie work is very valuable, being a full and perfect pen and pencil picture 
of the Great Rebellion, and illustrates everything capable of delineation by 
the pencil and graver. 

Sold only by subscription, at the following prices : 

EmTjossed Clotli, _ _ - - per "Vol^ $55,00 

lL.ctvllaei*, 3L.ll>rary Style, - - - « G.OO 

-A.i'a,l»t?s<ivie JMox'occo, - - - ** G.OO 

H«lf Oalf, __---- «« 7,r,0 

Agents Wanted. Apply to 

BELKNAP & BLISS, Hartford, Conn. 

DICTIONARY 

OF THE 

I[.^.:y^0ngrcf3f3 and General ffiaucnimcui 

Compiled as a Book of Reference for the American People. 

By CHARLES LANMAN. 



This volume contains about Five Thousand Bior.RAPniES, as well as 
a large amount of official information connected with the General Govern- 
ment not to be found in any other publication. As a book of Reference it 

is invaluable. Sold only by subscription at the following prices : 

In CJloth Binding, _ _ _ _ - $4r.OO 

In J^il>rary Jr»liooi>, ----- 4.50 

In Half Turkey ]VIorocco, - - - - 5.00 

Agents Wanted. Apply to 

BELKNAP & BLISS, Hartford, Conn. 



'A 



^ Vi p 6 3 5 



